Community life in Ecuador

Anthropologist professor Caroline Moser spent eight and a half months in the Ecuadorian city of Guayaquil in 1978. It was the first of many visits as Moser began to chart the development of the community.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

Moser wanted to live alongside the 244 households that she studied in depth. Her husband and two children lived in Guayaquil with her as she began her research.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

Moser's book, Ordinary Families, Extraordinary Lives, was written as a result of her relationship with the community.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

Between 1978 and 2004, Moser returned to the slum settlement of Indio Guayas 10 times, seeing changes in the way people lived.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

On each visit she stayed for more than a month.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

Cooking on a kerosene stove inside a bamboo home.
Photograph: Brian Moser

Water floods in to the slum.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

Picking the way along a path connecting houses.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

Walking over the swamp.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

Moser - now director of Manchester University's global urban research centre - wanted to take a long-term perspective with her work.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

Over almost three decades, many changes took place. These included electricity, running water and houses made of cement blocks instead of bamboo.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

"Materially, these families are a lot better off than they were in the 70s," says Moser.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser

Ordinary Families, Extraordinary Lives is published by Brookings Press of Washington DC.
Photograph: Brian/Caroline Moser