Interdisciplinary human geographer with expertise in (postcolonial) agri-food systems and development, political ecology, food security, food justice, urban foodscapes, food pedagogies and qualitative methods

Sara Brouwer is an assistant professor at UU's Human Geography and Spatial Planning Department. After completing her BSc in Human Geography at the same department, she moved to Scotland to study for an MSc in Environment, Culture and Society and a Master by Research in Human Geography at the University of Edinburgh. Sara also obtained her PhD in Human Geography at the University of Edinburgh, funded by a Perfect Storm Interdisciplinary Doctoral Training Scholarship from the Leverhulme Trust.

Through the lens of political ecology and based on ethnographic and qualitative fieldwork, Sara's PhD thesis explored how urban foodways and foodscapes stand in relation to postcolonial agrarian histories, socio-ecological imaginaries and conceptions of gender and modernity among different generations in urban Zimbabwe. Complicating the dominant food security framework, Sara's research provides an intimate understanding of how everyday social and cultural meanings and practices of food are constructed in time and space in a midsized high density town in Zimbabwe.

Funded by a UU Migration and Societal Change seed money grant, her current research focuses on migration, food and the inclusive city (MIGFOODCITY). She also received a UCU teaching & research grant on inclusive pedagogy. 

During her PhD and in her current position, Sara taught various courses in human geography, African studies, environmental sociology, political geography, international development and research design.

She was selected to attend the Clinton Global Initiative 2017 at Northeastern University in Boston, for which she created a children's book, Farai's Favourite Food. Sara currently uses the book to start a dialogue about her research on the socio-cultural aspects of urban food security in Zimbabwe.