Messing with Methods in More-than-Human Worlds I

Session Submission Type: Open Panel

Abstract

A multitude of political, technoscientific and ecological disruptions are challenging the ‘myth’ of human exceptionalism, forcing researchers to find new ways of understanding, and intervening in, a range of human/nonhuman encounters. From reconfigured definitions of ‘agency’ and the ‘social’ to renewed explorations of ‘co-presence’ and ‘mutual becoming,’ more-than-human approaches can exemplify Donna Haraway’s invitation to ‘stay with the trouble’ of human/nonhuman entanglements. But actually doing this research is hard. There is still a tendency, as David Abram puts it, to speak “about such entities only behind their backs,” instead of actively calling out and listening to them. And when we do succeed with that task, we still face the challenge of how to (re)tell these stories, or even trickier, how to ‘take action.’ This 3-part session provides a space for a collective, transdisciplinary effort to consider these methodological possibilities and limitations, and to share even our messiest experiments in creating and communicating knowledge necessary for thriving in more-than-human worlds.

Sub Unit

• Papers for Open Panels / Messing with Methods in More-than-Human Worlds

Chair

• kat Jungnickel, Goldsmiths

Individual Presentations

• Hospice for a Dying Species: Institutionalizing Semi-Wild Orangutans - Juno Salazar Parrenas, The Ohio State University

• Becoming Flock - Anne Galloway, Victoria University of Wellington

• Messing with methods in mud with pigs and mangroves - Kate Judith, UNSW; Hélène Ahlberger Le Deunff, University of Sydney

Session Organizers

• Anne Galloway, Victoria University of Wellington

• Jaz Hee-jeong Choi

• kat Jungnickel, Goldsmiths