The Troubled Region in 2025

Dear friends,

I meant for this post to have different words, but it was a long January and I am rather lost for them to be honest.

So for now, some important information about this newsletter, and me, in 2025.

1. The Troubled Region is going (mostly) paid-subscriber-only.

It has been important to me that this newsletter be free-access, but I'm going to try something different this year and start paywalling the content.

If you find the reporting and reflecting that I do here and elsewhere valuable, and you are not yet a paid subscriber, I hope you'll consider becoming one!🤘

Apart from the journey of learning how to value my own labour, I am also hoping that more paid subs will help me — as part of a staunch community of independent journalists and media-makers across the US and Latin America and internationally* — to keep doing what we do.

I'll still provide the odd free missive, but the meaty stuff is going to be for paying subscribers only, and, well, if there are enough subscriptions I will be able to put the newsletter out more often.

• If you are already a paid subscriber - do nothing, sit back and wait for the content! You are already The Troubled Region royalty!
• If you are a free subscriber - you can convert to a paid subscription by opening the newsletter in your browser - click on 'Account' at the top right of the page and follow the prompt to 'View plans' ✌️
• If you are a lurker but ready to commit - see the prompt below👇

If you feel so moved, you can encourage others to sign up by sharing this link and pointing them to the pink 'Subscribe' button to the right of the page.

Some glimpses/reminders of the themes I cover:

• Forced displacement from southern Mexico to the US and now back again
• Mexico's ostensible fight with the US to ban GMO corn on its territories
• Feminist activism and reproductive rights in Mexico and Latin America
• The US-Mexico weapons supply chain
• Critical minerals, the energy transition, and extractivism - e.g. Mexico's lithium
• Transnational drug supply chains - e.g. opium poppy, 'drug precursors'
• Local and international approaches to addressing and preventing gender-based violence
• Communities fulfilling and defending the right to housing - fighting forced eviction in Mexico City, favela urbanism in Rio de Janeiro
• Forced disappearance and militarization in Mexico
• Music, beer, mezcal, traveling, and parties

2. I'm also looking for more paid work.

Believe it or not, independent writing and journalism pays very little!

Fortunately, I have other skills and qualifications which I love to put into practice with and for people doing creative, strategic and solid projects in the world. To wit:

I have a PhD in Gender & Cultural Studies from the University of Sydney and over 20 years experience working with non-profits, media and academia in Australia, the US, Mexico and Brazil.

The years and diversity of experience has granted me expertise in a range of topics in fields ranging from human rights to business along with outstanding skills in research and writing.

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I do:

• Report writing and editing
• Social research design
• Qualitative research
• Stakeholder consultation
• Research and analysis for policy advocacy
• Knowledge translation

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I also do:

• Spanish-English translation
• English language teaching and tutoring
• Academic mentoring, including dissertation supervision
• Editing and proof-reading

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As a research and writing consultant my most recent work includes:

• a review of programming priorities for a national coalition of HIV/AIDS and LGBTIQA+ organisations
• a research and recommendations document from a group of First Nations women scholars advising government on policy priorities for gender-based violence prevention in First Nations communities
• an internal report for an international non-profit on the impacts of feminist and gender-focussed journalism in Global South countries

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As a mentor, tutor and editor I have most recently worked with Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking non-profit/advocacy leaders and journalists, as well as doctoral students presenting their research (for example, one on youth movements in North Africa and another on LGBTIQ+ rights in diverse cultural contexts). I've also done proof-reading for a government department and manuscript editing for academics.

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If you'd like to work together on any or all of the above, I'd love to hear from you! Email me to book a time to chat: anndeslandesconsult@gmail.com

Thankyou for reading this far and for your support for The Work. I really did think I would have a bit more to say as the empire goes full fash, but I think that, like a lot of us, I am dazed from the deliberate shock and thunder coming from the US, unable to parse it fully while hustling to meet the costs of living, and preserving energy for the years ahead. Certainly here in southern Mexico we're beginning to register the realities of new tariffs, USAID cuts, mass deportation, and mass militarization; themes on which I'll be able to share reporting very soon.

Meanwhile FWIW!1!1! here's some of the content that has been helping me to stay with the trouble:

• Naomi Klein and Mehdi Hasan are Unshocked
• Blúiríní Béaloidis 18 - Brigid in Folk Tradition (today is Imbolc/St Brigid's Day in the northern hemisphere 🔥💚 )
• How I quit alcohol podcast by Danni Carr, which is grounded in Compassionate Inquiry and Australian drinking cultures (e.g. the latest episode is called "From Total Piss Wreck to Proud Father")
• Johanne Sacreblu, the parody musical made by Mexican creators Camila Aurora and Héctor Guillén as a response to Emilia Pérez
• Tens of thousands filling the streets of Berlin against the neo-Nazi AfD party, singing for all our lives rn, arguably,:

I hope you'll be joining me for the next and newly Troubled edition of The Troubled Region.

In love and struggle,

Ann.

*I am a part of and/or work closely with colleagues in networks like Frontline Freelance Mexico, Cooperativa del Periodismo, Impacta Cine, South Feminist Futures, and The Gender Beat.