Paula F. Saravia
Assistant Teaching Professor
University of Washington
Paula Francisca Saravia is an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Washington, Seattle. She is a medical anthropologist whose research focuses on lived experiences of environmental precarity, Indigenous healing practices, and collective forms of care and healing. She holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of California, San Diego, and her work bridges academic scholarship with community engagement and advocacy. Paula received her undergraduate training in social anthropology at the Universidad de Chile, where she specialized in medical anthropology, later working on poverty reduction programs and teaching as a Lecturer. In 2006, she was awarded an Erasmus Mundus grant from the European Union to pursue the interdisciplinary master’s program Phoenix Dynamics of Health and Welfare. Her doctoral research examined tuberculosis illness experiences and modes of sociopolitical engagement within Aymara communities in Bolivia and Chile. Her current research explores the complexities of care amid environmental precarity among Indigenous communities in Chile, examining the role of language in healing, Indigenous wellbeing, and the sociopolitical relationships Indigenous communities forge with state institutions and local actors.