Messing with methods in mud with pigs and mangroves

• In Event: Messing with Methods in More-than-Human Worlds I

Abstract

Thinking mud is something many humans are not well practiced in, but mangroves and pigs can do it well. We are making ‘theory in the mud’ (Haraway 2016) through allowing the practices of mangroves and pigs to guide us into the shifting, the multiple, the earthly, the sticky, the dirty and the dangerous of mud. Understanding pigs’ practice of wallowing, and the accumulation and settling in mud of mangroves as grounded ways of being, mud lets us see these more-than-human worlds as sticky webs of encounters.

Our studies take an interest in the muddy world making of pigs and mangroves as they rub against those human desires which locate cleanness, control and identity in opposition to muddiness. The mangroves of Sydney negotiate their world making around the margins not only of the harbour and rivers of the city but also of the human imaginings of these spaces. In the capital of Kiribati, pigs’ mud weaves together modern and traditional waterworlds.

In lurking with the mangroves of Sydney and the pigs of Kiribati we notice their accommodating, edge-seeking, space-shaping methods. Much of this adaptive and experimental practice incorporates quantities of discharges, toxins, and human practices. We have made particular choices about the tools, practices, theories and words we use to engage and think with our non-human collaborators. We find there hosts, guests, parasites, kin, co-producers and co-participants. In this paper we will share our own methodological journeys in engaging theoretical perspectives within mangrove and pig worlds.

Authors

• Kate Judith, UNSW

• Hélène Ahlberger Le Deunff, University of Sydney