Anneli Ekblom

My research and teaching are experimentations in ways of ‘seeing the world relationally’. The climate crises and the precarious conditions of the Anthropocene calls for new ways of representing and knowing the world. I study relations between humans-nature ranging from changes in vegetation and settlement to conflicts and contestations when it comes to conservation and heritage, exploring forms of representation that convey the intimate entanglement of people, other organisms and landscapes.

My interest in Historical Ecology was formed during the time I wrote my PhD thesis at Uppsala University, cross examining many sources; archaeological data, written sources, interviews with local residents, palaeoecology and landscape analysis to produce an environmental history of a place. Furthermore, the thesis presented environmental data from a region, southern Mozambique were there had been no similar analysis, enabling me to pioneer in this area. After completion of my thesis I was fortunate to be able to expand my interest also to southern Africa, working within Kruger National Park with vegetation history during a three year long post-doc at Long term ecology lab, Oxford University. Coming back to Uppsala I continued expanding my interest in historical ecology through various research projects both in Southern and Eastern Africa and Sweden, finally resulting in the creation of a masterprogramme in Global Environmental History. I have for a long time been engaged in the student initiated and driven Centre for Environment and development studies (Cemus) both as a lecturer and examinator and as director (2017-2018). Currently I am also associated researcher in the Climate Change Leadership research node. See more detailed information on Projects and research on the departemental personal webbpage.

Apart from the above engagements I also have a number of comissions of trust: Mar 2016- Member of Swedish national committee for global environmental change (Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences); Jan 2015- Chair of the Board of Societas Archeologica Upsaliensis, SAU.; Sep 2014- Scientific steering committee of Integrated History and Future for People on Earth IHOPE; April 2015-Sep 2018 Steeringgroup for Centre for Biological Diversity (CBM), SLU and Uppsala University. I am currently the studydirector of the PhD programmes at Department of Archaeology and Ancient History.

Landscape transformations and socio-ecological management in Limpopo National Park, Mozambique: The project is funded by VR 2012-2015 (collaborations Michel Notelid and Rebecca Witter). We use archaeology, anthropology and paleoecology to analyse the long-term and contemporary socio-natural dynamics in Limpopo National Park (PNL) and lower Limpopo Valley, Mozambique. Our aim is to inform and improve conservation and heritage decision-making in PNL. See project webpage.

Adaptation and Resilience to Climate Change (ARCC) (funded by the Swedish Research Council, VR in association with Sida 2017-2020): Countries such in eastern Africa require new frameworks for envisioning and planning desired futures.We ask how socioecological systems may respond under future climate change and social scenarios focusing on the last 300 years? See project webpage.

Re-Contextualising Climate Change: Using data from different time periods and parts of the globe, this theme is intended to examine how researchers conventionally understand past climate change, and asks how might we rethink the material record of social adaptabilities and transformations to better understand what it means to live through an era of rapid climate change? see more

Ekologiska rum Mälardalen (The ecological dynamics of places in Mälardalen): The project, aims to analyse and synthesise the current knowledge on palaeo-ecology, human transformations of the landscape and ecological dynamics in the Mälar valley. See publication Framtidens naturvärden i kulturmiljöer - fallstudie Gamla Uppsala.

Long term landscape dynamics of the Southern Africa savanna: The development of tools for fine-tuning climate projection models, biome-shift predictions and land cover change is of crucial relevance for decision making and policy formulation with respect to biodiversity, livelihood security and social planning.

Archaeobotany and contract archaeology: As an archaeobotanical consultant for contract archaeology since 1999I have aimed to develop the archaeobotanical method to address archaeological research within the context of Swedish heritage management and contract archaeology. Through the archaeobotanical consultancy Geark I have compiled 61 archaeobotanical reports (10 co-authored with Jennie Andersson).