Barbara Vodopivec

Project

Slum Tourism in the Americas: Commodifying Urban Poverty and Violence

http://www.ethnologie.uni-muenchen.de/personen/professorinnen/duerr/slum_tourism/index.html

Education and work

I have a BA degree in Cultural Studies from the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia (1999-2004). In 2008 I have finished my MA degree in Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology from Leiden University in the Netherlands. As part of the degree I have conducted my research fieldwork in Guatemala where I analysed development discourse perpetuating international volunteer work and volunteer tourism. After finishing my MA degree I have worked for national (Slovenian) and international NGOs in the field of international development cooperation, human rights, global education and sustainable development. I have managed and implemented projects in the field of responsible tourism and human rights (women empowerment, child rights, LGBT rights) in Ghana, Burkina Faso and Kosovo. In Slovenia I have worked extensively on awareness raising activities, campaigning and education on international human rights and global issues, with a particular interest in development discourses in the arena of international development cooperation and humanitarian aid. Through Slovenian platform of development and humanitarian NGOs I have also followed national and international policies and mechanisms in international development cooperation, humanitarian aid and global education. For the last three years I have also been acting as the election observer for the EU, and I have observed elections in Democratic Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone and Pakistan.

Publications

• Save the World in a Week: Volunteer Tourism, Development and Difference. European Journal of Development Research, Vol 23, 1, 111-128
• 'Slovene Travel Writing', in East European Travel Writing in Europe: A Bibliography, ed. Wendy Bracewell & Alex Drace-Francis (Budapest: CEU Press, 2007), pp. 459-69