Raquel de la Cruz Modino (Santa Cruz, 1979) is a senior lecturer in Anthropology and heads the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of La Laguna (ULL), alongside professors Josué Gutiérrez Barroso and Grecy Pérez Amores. She studied Philosophy at the ULL and pursued her doctoral studies in an interdepartmental programme of Geography and History. She completed a Master’s in Tourism Business Management. She received the Marqués de Lozoya Cultural Research Award from the Ministry of Culture in 2009. Later, she studied at Memorial University in Newfoundland, Canada, and at the Norwegian College of Fishery Science in Tromso, Norway, thanks to a postdoctoral mobility programme and was hired by the Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology. She is the author and co-author of numerous specialised articles in national and international journals. It has been a very pleasant conversation with a woman passionate about the sea, who obtained her position as a senior lecturer at the ULL three years ago. At one point in the conversation, Raquel stops and tells me: “The sea touched me, and I never want to disconnect from it”.
-And why the sea?
“Because it’s part of my home, my territory, my heritage, the landscape with which I identify. The world has a greater portion of seas than land masses.”
-There’s something very interesting about your work. You’re studying the sociological behaviours of Villa and Puerto de Garachico, facing the threat of the sea. Do you have conclusions yet?
“We are studying, thanks to a European project, how the residents of this municipality in Tenerife interpret and coexist with the stormy seas.”
-I find it fascinating. I have a great affection for Garachico.
“Well, some of the first conclusions are related to the enormous capacity that local populations have to live with uncertainty and the immense efforts that, for example, local entrepreneurs make to rebuild every time the sea strikes them.”
-Which is often, isn’t it, Raquel?
“We have assessed the thresholds over which this coexistence is possible, and we hope that improvements in early warning systems and other planned interventions will expand them. However, without the commitment of every involved administration and without constant and adequate communication, this coexistence may become unbearable in a changing scenario or context, in terms of recurrence and flood forecasting.”
-Are fishermen special people? I mean in terms of their behaviours?
“I think any worker in the primary sector is special, as they maintain the little we have left of local production on the islands, offering us a minimal food sovereignty.”
-You seem sad when you say it.
“It saddens me that there are huge confusions and many prejudices about professional fishing and the men and women who work around the sea. I work with professionals across the artisanal or inshore fishing production chain. This includes women who manage the fishers’ guilds, those who still handle the marketing of the product, to fishers who go out to sea using highly selective fishing techniques and who have incredible ecological knowledge.”
-You say it with admiration…
“The good thing is that all these professionals maintain continuous contact and monitoring of the state of marine resources. They are essential for researchers like me and for a good part of the restaurant sector on the islands. Plus, they provide the general population with highly nutritious foods, such as the various species of pelagic and semi-pelagic fish (mackerel, tuna species…) that reach the Canaries.”
(Raquel adds to her response that “I can’t say anything bad about someone who gets up every day at five in the morning to bring food home. But maybe we should focus on other types of users of our coasts who dedicate themselves to dirtying the sea and destroying marine life.” And I add that I couldn’t agree more with the anthropologist).
-I confess I’ve never heard of a social science concerning the sea. To me, it’s unprecedented.
“And I tell you that this is why it is very difficult to explain what I do. However, I feel immensely fortunate to work with such a diversity of professionals, including fishers, tourism entrepreneurs, fellow biologists, geographers, engineers…”
-What did you investigate in the Mar de las Calmas?
“I arrived at the coasts of La Restinga in 2003, interested in understanding how the declaration of the marine reserve may have changed the work strategies of the artisanal fishers who work in the Mar de las Calmas. In addition to their relationship with resources that were now protected, I was also interested in the development of marine tourism activities in the area and how these might impact the local economic fabric. Furthermore, this marine reserve had been created and was managed with significant involvement from the artisanal fishing sector. It was an example of collaboration between fishers, grouped around their guild, the administrations, and my university. I learned a lot.”
-Did you return after your first stay?
“Yes, to understand in depth how the families, both linked to the fishing sector and marine tourism, were recovering after the volcanic eruption of 2011.”
-What was your work in Canada and Norway, besides almost dying of cold?
“Well, I had time to do a bit of everything, yes, despite the cold. But above all, I focused on analysing the governance of protected marine spaces, which isn’t a matter limited to management, but refers to politics itself and the way the dialogue is articulated between the Government, the market, and civil society, given certain needs or challenges, which may be environmental or conservation-related.”
-Raquel, can we talk about an anthropology of the sea?
“Yes, there is an anthropology of fishing, interested in studying the socio-economic and socio-cultural changes in coastal or littoral populations; and a maritime anthropology, from which we investigate with an eminently applied vocation, trying, for example, to improve the marketing of artisanal fishing products and to advance in terms of that food sovereignty I mentioned earlier.”
-You mentioned earlier that sometimes it’s hard to understand your work. What are its practical applications?
“Well, besides advising on the design of conservation and fisheries management policies, we carry out a multitude of environmental awareness and citizen science projects.”
-Like what, for example?
“Look, with Patricia Aznar and Natacha Aguilar de Soto, a few years ago we registered an APP to report cetacean sightings. With the PESCATUR research group – fishing, tourism and natural resources management – where I’ve worked for more than two decades, we have developed plans for the sustainable development of marine tourist products or activities. And we have launched several initiatives to improve the marketing of artisanal or inshore fishing products. For example, with the Cabildo de Tenerife, we worked on creating the ‘Artisanal Fishing’ brand, which can now be seen in some markets and guilds.”
-You continue with Garachico, don’t you?
“Yes, but apart from that, thanks to the involvement of the doctoral candidates I’m currently working with, we investigate the characteristics of the interactions between different uses and users of the sea and marine megafauna to, for example, provide better responses to strandings of species like marine turtles.”
-Why did you fall in love with the sea?
“I suppose spending every summer in Los Cristianos had something to do with it.”
-And I suppose because you live on an island, of course.
“I admit I like living on islands. In fact, Newfoundland and Tromso are also islands. Some people love visiting big cities, and I am passionate about knowing the various forms of adaptation, cultural expressions, and appropriation of means, resources, and life possibilities in island environments.”
-Sometimes islands do not arouse as much interest as continents. Or so it seems to me.
“I am surprised at the little attention island studies receive, even though there is an instrumental use of island facts in certain sectoral policies. The sea gives motivation to our existence, in a broad sense. So more than a matter of infatuation, I think talking about the sea involves referring to a constitutive dimension of our people. How can we overlook those who have something to do with the ocean surrounding us?”
(During the conversation at Los Limoneros, we talked about the sense of community, that sometimes we forget about the social sciences applied to any aspect of life, that she works with very healthy and sincere people, about her stay in the Solomon Islands, where she intensified her relationship with the sea and its people. It’s a shame that this woman who is indeed in love with the sea and the anthropology of the sea, which exists and is very much alive, had limited time. One day she will show me her research on the risks, which is something fascinating, for populations like Garachico and what its people think. Garachico, attacked on one side by the volcano and on the other by the sea, like two such dangerous threats. I confess it was a very pleasant conversation, which lasted longer than expected and Raquel even had to dash off as she was running late for an appointment with students).
