Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Economy of Child Labor in the Acai Commodity Chain

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Vanderbilt University doctoral candidate Monte D. Hendrickson, supervised by Dr. Beth A. Conklin, will conduct research addressing the cultural criteria of children's roles in producing export commodities, a subject that has received little anthropological attention. Hendrickson's study focuses specifically on acai production in the lower Amazon region of Brazil and investigates children's roles in the production of this commodity, which is marketed as an environmentally sustainable and socially responsible product that enhances the livelihoods of the rural poor. This research seeks to understand how the moral and economic processes involved in a global commodity boom affect the lives of children and the cultural politics of childhood in poor families at the production end of an export-commodity chain. To evaluate these complex links between acai and children's wellbeing, research will be conducted in two rural communities, Gurupa and Curralinho, in the state of Para. Research will involve multiple sources of qualitative and quantitative data to yield insights into local concepts, understandings, and perspectives on decision-making concerning children's health, education, and labor, and children's contributions to acai production. Statistical data from official records and findings from household surveys will be complemented and contextualized by ethnographic participant-observation, open-ended interviewing, semi-structured and structured interviews, participatory photo interviews with children, and life histories collected in each community. This research is significant in that it contributes to an under-theorized dimension of human rights concerns: the question of the moral and ethical evaluation of children's labor activities in family/household contexts. This investigation will produce a rich case study of work conditions, effects on income, education, and health, and attitudes toward children and childhood in these rural Amazonian communities. The dissertation based on this field study will juxtapose this local case study against discourses at the regional and international levels concerning the benefits of acai, fair trade, rural household production, and child labor.