As an ethnographer of science, medicine, and the environment, my research investigates how human-nonhuman encounters become pathological and explores the social contexts in which biomedical knowledge and pharmaceutical technologies are produced.
I am particularly interested in how armed violence and its historical legacies shape health outcomes and influence the understanding and management of diseases in Latin America, with a focus on neglected tropical diseases and neurodegenerative conditions in Colombia.
Initially trained in biology (Universidad de los Andes, Colombia), I completed master’s degrees in biotechnology (University of Strasbourg, France) and Science & Technology Studies (STS), followed by a PhD in STS (York University, Canada). I was a research fellow at Harvard’s Science, Technology, and Society Program, and later held dual affiliations with the Institute for Science, Innovation & Society (University of Oxford, UK) and the Interdisciplinary Center for Development Studies (Universidad de los Andes). Currently, I am a postdoctoral fellow of the Connected Minds Program at York University.
Maraña: War and Disease in the Jungles of Colombia
AUTHOR
Lina Pinto García
PRESS
Chicago University Press
Year of publication
2025
My first book delves into the relationship between war and disease, focusing on Colombian armed conflict and the skin disease known as cutaneous leishmaniasis. Cutaneous leishmaniasis, transmitted by female sandflies, produces skin lesions of varying size and shape. In Colombia, the insect vector of the disease is native to the same forested environments that have served as the main stage for one of the longest and most violent wars in Latin American history. As a result, the populations most affected by leishmaniasis in Colombia are members of the state army and nonstate armed groups. Maraña explores how leishmaniasis and the armed conflict are inextricably connected and mutually reinforcing. Maraña means “tangle” in Spanish but is also commonly used in Colombia to name the entangled greenery, braided lianas, and dense foliage that characterize the tropical forests where leishmaniasis transmission typically occurs. I argue that leishmaniasis and the war are not merely linked but enmarañadas to each other through narratives, technologies, and practices produced by the state, medicine, biomedical research, and the armed conflict itself. All told, Maraña is a passionate study of how war has shaped the production of scientific knowledge about leishmaniasis and access to its treatments in Colombia.
Lina Pinto García
research
My research integrates Medical Anthropology and Science and Technology Studies (STS) through ethnographic investigations of neurodegenerative and neglected tropical diseases. Central to my work is the critical exploration of ethics, power, care, and the state, particularly within the contexts of biomedical research, pharmaceuticals, global health, and public health. In particular, my earlier and current research focuses on the intersection of armed violence and health in Colombia.
past research
My PhD research (2014-2020) explored the connections between Colombia’s armed conflict and cutaneous leishmaniasis, a neglected, vector-borne skin disease. Conducted through multi-sited ethnography after the 2016 peace accord, this research revealed how war shaped responses to leishmaniasis across military, guerrilla, and civilian settings. This work underpins my forthcoming book, Maraña: War and Disease in the Jungles of Colombia, to be published by the University of Chicago Press in March 2025, and has led to publications in Medical Anthropology Quarterly, Critical Public Health, Tapuya, and others. As a postdoc, I led the British Academy-funded Diseased Landscapes project (2021-2024), investigating how illicit crops and conflict reshape ecosystems and health, particularly among coca cultivators. This work yielded a policy paper, a public health event, and two forthcoming articles.
Current research
As part of the Connected Minds program at York University, my current project ethnographically investigates how emerging pharmaceutical technologies for Alzheimer’s prevention intersect with the preservation of personal, familial, and collective memory in post-conflict Colombia, particularly in Yarumal. This town, with over 14,000 victims of violence and extensive displacement, also faces a high prevalence of early-onset Alzheimer’s due to the hereditary ‘Paisa mutation.’ Since the 1980s, the Neurosciences Group of Antioquia (GNA) has studied 6,000 Yarumal residents, including 1,200 carriers of the mutation. Key objectives include examining the drivers behind Alzheimer’s drug innovation amid violence; understanding clinical trials’ socio-political context; and analyzing the role of hope in promoting equity and justice in medical and peacebuilding terms.
Peer-reviewed articles
Military Dogs and Their Soldier Companions: The More-than-human Biopolitics of Leishmaniasis in Conflict-torn Colombia
Poisonously single-minded: public health implications of the pharmaceuticalization of leishmaniasis in Colombia
