Meet the team

A Latinx anthropologist and health researcher, Marinel has worked internationally for many years in justice-oriented qualitative research and advocacy with marginalized groups. The proud daughter of a Panamanian mother, Marinel grew up in rural Arkansas (U.S.), navigating two very different worlds. This led to an early awareness of systemic oppression and, later, an appreciation for the power of individuals to enact their own transformative ethics within those frameworks. Her graduate work focused on Mexican immigrant women working in assisted living facilities in Washington, exploring ways they performed their values through their work and created a daily resistance against the standard profit model of institutional care. Since moving to Chilliwack in 2016, Marinel has been grateful for opportunities to hone her skills in community-based participatory research methods, working within the Centre for Health Evaluation and Outcome Sciences (CHÉOS) and as Research Manager to Dr. Cindy Jardine, Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Health and Community at UFV. She also recently guided a youth-led peer engagement project with the Cyrus Centre, exploring Chilliwack services through the eyes of substance-affected and homeless youth. Marinel continues to focus on these areas as a Researcher at CHASI, with the core goal of centering stakeholders in the research process and working with them to identify ways to improve conditions for their communities.