Multispecies ethnography: theory, techniques and current challenges

Article Sidebar

PDF (Español (España)) HTML (Español (España))
Published: Mar 11, 2024
DOI: https://doi.org/10.21676/16574923.5459
Keywords:
multispecies ethnography, nature/culture relationship, non-humans, multispecies studies, ethnography

Main Article Content

Juan David Arias Henao
Politécnico Colombiano Jaime Izasa Cadavid
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0462-3964
Denisse Roca-Servat
Universidad de Antioquia
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2872-6471

Abstract

We live in a crisis of multiple dimensions that jeopardizes not only the continuity of human life but also its interrelation with other species. This situation demands experimenting with theoretical tools and methodological approaches that allow us to rethink the human-nature relationship. One of these innovative tools is Multispecies Ethnography, which has been the subject of various studies for just over a decade, most of them in the Anglo-Saxon academia, and to a lesser extent in Latin America. Based on an analysis of academic literature, this paper aims to identify its techniques and theoretical aspects, while also highlighting its current challenges. One of the main findings is that ethnography has been primarily designed to investigate humans; however, the inclusion of animals, plants, microorganisms, and some biotechnological devices in the foreground of multispecies ethnographies is sparking new debates about the importance of reconsidering what is referred to as "humanity" and "nature." Similarly, while there is an increasingly robust multispecies theoretical and conceptual framework, there is still room for further exploration of new methodological approaches.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Article Details

How to Cite
Arias Henao, J. D., & Roca-Servat, D. . (2024). Multispecies ethnography: theory, techniques and current challenges. Jangwa Pana, 23(1), 1–15. https://doi.org/10.21676/16574923.5459
Issue
Vol. 23 No. 1 (2024): Etnografías I: En el camino de la etnografía
Section
Dossier: Etnografías I (part 1)

References

Acero, M. (2019). Esa relación tan especial con los perros y con los gatos: la familia multiespecie y sus metáforas. Tabula Rasa, 32, 157-179.

Aroca, L. (2022). Apicultura de conservación en la Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta: entramados, transformaciones y devenires inter-especie [Trabajo de grado para optar al título de Antropólogo, Universidad del Magdalena].

Bear, C., & Eden, S. (2011). Thinking like a Fish? Engaging with Nonhuman Difference through Recreational Angling. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 29(2), 336-352.

Bispo, N. (2015). Colonização, quilombos, modos e significações. Instituto Nacional de Ciência e Tecnologia de Inclusão no Ensino Superior e na Pesquisa (INCTI).

Blaser, M., & De la Cadena, M. (2009). «Introduction» World Anthropologies Network (WAN) / Red de Antropologías del Mundo (RAM). Electronic Journal (4), 3-10.

Bolton, M. (2020). We Need to Talk About the Dog! Explorations of Human–Canine Relations and Community Hybridity in Bolivia. The Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology, 25(1), 28-47.

Brombin, A. (2019). The Ecovillage Movement: New Ways to Experience Nature. Environmental Values, 28, 191-210.

Brondo, K. V. (2018). Entanglements in multispecies voluntourism: conservation and Utila's affect economy. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 27(4), 590-607.

Celermajer, D., Schlosberg, D., Rickards, L., Stewart-Harawira, M., Thaler, M., Tschakert, P., Verlie, B., & Winter, C. (2020). Multispecies justice: theories, challenges, and a research agenda for environmental politics. Environmental Politics, 30(1-2), 119-140.

Crutzen, P., & Stoermer, E. (2000). The Anthropocene. Global Change Newsletter, (41), pp. 17-18.

Dashper, K. (2020). Holidays with my horse: Human-horse relationships and multispecies tourism experiences. Tourism Management Perspectives, 34, 100678.

De la Cadena, M., & Martínez, S. (2020). In Colombia some cows have raza, others also have breed: Maintaining the presence of the translation offers analytical possibilities. The Sociological Review, 68(2), 369-384.

De Ruiter, P., Wolters, V., & Moore, J. (2005). Dynamic Food Webs. Multispecies Assemblages, Ecosystem Development and Environmental. En P. De Ruiter, V. Wolters, & J. Moore, Dynamic Food Webs (pp. 3-9). Academic Press.

Descola, P. (2014). All too Human (still). HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory, 4(2), 267-273.

Donati, K. (2019). ‘Herding is his favourite thing in the world’: Convivial world-making on a multispecies farm. Journal of Rural Studies, 66, 119-129.

Durand, L. (2020). Covid19 y el retorno de los animales. Apuntes desde la etnografía multiespecie. Notas de coyuntura del CRIM, (19), 1-5.

Durand, L., & Sundberg, J. (2019). Sobre la ecología política posthumanista. Sociedad y Ambiente, 7(20), 7-27.

Eraso-López, A. (2018). ¡Ojo con el perro! Un acercamiento etnográfico a la (re)significación de animales no-humanos domésticos (Perros) en un parque de Cali [Trabajo de grado, Universidad ICESI].

Escobar, A. (2010). Ecologías políticas postconstructivistas. Revista Sustentabilidades, 2, 2-5.

Escobar, A. (2014). Sentipensar con la tierra: nuevas lecturas sobre desarrollo, territorio y diferencia. Universidad Autónoma Latinoamericana (UNAULA).

Fonck, M., & Jacob, D. (2018). «Escuchando el llamado del bosque»: explorando las dimensiones afectivas de la conservación ambiental desde la etnografía multiespecies. Santuario El Cañi, Chile. Revista Austral de Ciencias Sociales, 35, 221-238.

García, C. (2017). La percepción participante como una herramienta metodológica feminista: Una aplicación a los estudios de género. Revista de Antropología Iberoamericana, 12(2), 125-146.

Gatto, G., & McCardle, J. R. (2019). Multispecies Design and Ethnographic Practice: Following Other-Than-Humans as a Mode of Exploring Environmental Issues. Sustainability, 11(18), 5032.

Gillespie, K. (2019). For a Politicized Multispecies Ethnography: Reflections on a Feminist Geographic Pedagogical Experiment. Politics and Animals, 5, 17-32.

Ginn, F., Beisel, U., & Barua, M. (2014). Flourishing with Awkward Creatures: Togetherness, Vulnerability, Killing. Environmental Humanities, 4(1), 113-123.

Green, A. (2011). Significados de vida: Espejo de nuestra memoria en defensa de la Madre Tierra. Universidad de Antioquia.

Greenhough, B. (2012). Where species meet and mingle: endemic human-virus relations, embodied communication and more-than-human agency at the Common Cold Unit 1946–90. Cultural Geographies, 19(3), 281-301.

Haraway, D. (1985). A Manifesto for Cyborgs: Science Technology and Socialist Feminism in the 1980s. Socialist Review, 80, 65-108.

Haraway, D. (1988). Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the privilege of partial perspective. Feminist Studies, 14(3), 575-599.

Haraway, D. (2008). When Species Meet. University of Minnesota Press.

Haraway, D. (2019). Seguir con el problema. Generar parentesco en el Chtuluceno. Consonni.

Harding, S. (1986). The Science Question in Feminism. Cornell University Press.

Hartigan, J. (2021). Knowing Animals: Multispecies Ethnography and the Scope of Anthropology. American Anthropologist, 123(4), 846-860.

Holbraad, M., & Pedersen, M. A. (2017). The Ontological Turn: An Anthropological Exposition. Cambridge University Press.

Howes, D. (2019). Multisensory Anthropology. Annual Review of Anthropology, 48, pp. 17-28.

Hurn, S. (2012). Humans and other animals: Crosscultural perspectives on human-animal interactions. Pluto.

Ingold, T. (2000). The Perception of the Environment: Essays on Livelihood, Dwelling and Skill. Routledge.

Kirksey, E. (2012). Thneeds Reseeds: Figures of Biocultural Hope in the Anthropocene. Rachel Carson Perspectives, (9), 89-94.

Kirksey, E., & Helmreich, S. (2010). The emergence of multispecies ethnography. Cultural Anthropology, 25(4), 545-576.

Kohn, E. (2007). How dogs dream: Amazonian natures and the politics of transspecies engagement. American Ethnologist, 34(1), 3-24.

Kohn, E. (2012). Life ‘Itself’ Thinking Itself through Us: Thoughts from an Amazonian Forest [Ponencia]. Encuentro de la American Anthropological Association, San Francisco, California.

Lander, E. (2013). Crisis civilizatoria, límites del planeta, asaltos a la democracia y pueblos en resistencia. Estudios Latinoamericanos, 36, 29-58.

Latour, B. (1993). We Have Never Been Modern. Harvard University Press.

Latour, B. (2004). Politics of Nature: How to Bring the Sciences into Democracy. Harvard University Press.

Latour, B. (2008). Reensamblar lo social. Una introducción a la teoría del actor-red. Manantial.

Lloro-Bidart, T. (2018). A Feminist Posthumanist Multispecies Ethnography for Educational Studies. Educational Studies, 54(3), 253-270.

Lorimer, J. (2012). Multinatural geographies for the Anthropocene. Progress in Human Geography, 36(5), 593-612.

Lowe, C. (2010). Viral Clouds: Becoming H5N1 in Indonesia. Cultural Anthropology, 25, 625-649.

Martínez-Dueñas, W., & Perafán-Ledezma, A. (2017). Pensando la conservación desde el multinaturalismo en una localidad indígena de los andes colombianos. Universitas Humanística, 84, 77-107.

Menzel, P., & d'Aluisio, F. (2000). Robo sapiens: Evolution of a new species. Mit Press.

Mol, A. (2002). The Body Multiple: Ontology in Medical Practice. Duke University Press.

Moore, J. (2015a). Capitalism in the Web of Life: Ecology and the Accumulation of Capital. Verso Books.

Moore, L. J. (2015b). A Day at the Beach: Rising Sea Levels, Horseshoe Crabs, and Traffic Jams. Sociology, 49(5), 886-902.

Moore, L. J., & Kosut, M. (2014). Among the colony: Ethnographic fieldwork, urban bees and intra-species mindfulness. Ethnography, 15(4), 516-539.

Movimiento de Mujeres y Diversidades Indígenas por el Buen Vivir (2022) Argentina: ¡Basta de Terricidio! Stop Ecocidio International (SEI). 18 de agosto de 2022.

Nisly, J. (2019). Under one Roof Year-round. The Multispecies Intimacy of Cohabiting with Cows in Byre-houses since the Economic Enlightenment. Ethnologia Europaea, 49(2), 50-69.

Ogden, L. A., Hall, B., & Tanita, K. (2013). Animals, Plants, People, and Things. A Review of Multispecies Ethnography. Environment and Society: Advances in Research, 4(1), 5-24.

Ojeda, D., & Ruiz, D. (2023). Belicopedia. Ediciones Uniandes.

Pacini-Ketchabaw, V., Taylor, A., & Blaise, M. (2016). Decentring the Human in Multispecies Ethnographies. En C. Taylor, & C. Hughes, Posthuman Research Practices in Education (pp. 149-167). Palgrave Macmillan.

Parathian, H. E., McLennan, M. R., Hill, C. M., Fraz-o-Moreira, A., & Hockings, K. J. (2018). Breaking Through Disciplinary Barriers: Human–Wildlife Interactions and Multispecies Ethnography. International Journal of Primatology, 39(5), pp. 749-775.

Pardo, D. (2023). Sensory Co-laboring: Mine Detection Dogs and Handlers in Humanitarian Demining in Colombia. Environmental Humanities, 15(3), 30-51.

Pinto-García, L. (2022). Military Dogs and Their Soldier Companions: The More-than-human Biopolitics of Leishmaniasis in Conflict-torn Colombia. Medical Anthropology Quarterly, 36(2), 237-255.

Remis, M., & Jost, C. (2020). Elephants, Hunters, and Others: Integrating Biological Anthropology and Multispecies Ethnography in a Conservation Zone. American Anthropologist, 122(3), 459-472.

Ruiz, D., & Del Cairo, C. (2016). Los debates del giro ontológico en torno al naturalismo moderno. Revista de Estudios Sociales, (55), 193-204.

Sánchez-Maldonado, J. (2018). Familias-más-que-humanas: sobre las relaciones humanos/no-humanos y las posibilidades de una etnografía inter-especies en Colombia. Desenvolvimento e Meio Ambiente, 49, 305-317.

Sánchez-Maldonado, J. (2022). Aproximación a la coevolución entre humanos y cánidos y la consolidación de un programa de investigación en etnografía interespecies. Papel de Colgadura, 22, 93-99.

Singer, M. (2014). Zoonotic Ecosyndemics and Multispecies Ethnography. Anthropological Quarterly, 87(4), 1279-1309.

Smart, A. (2014). Critical perspectives on multispecies ethnography. Critique of Anthropology, 34(1), 3-7.

Sotelo, A. S. (2016). Etnografía acerca de la manera en que se piensan y representan los bosques: reseña al libro How Forests Think: Towards an Anthropology beyond the Human, de Eduardo Kohn. Boletín de Antropología, 31(52), 325-328.

Specter, M. (2012, 22 de octubre). Germs Are Us. New Yorker.

Stengers, I. (2005). Introductory Notes on an Ecology of Practices. Cultural Studies Review, 11(1), 183-196.

Stone, E. (2019). What’s in it for the cats?: cat shows as serious leisure from a multispecies perspective. Leisure Studies, 38(3), 381-393.

Swanson, H. (2017). Methods for Multispecies Anthropology. Thinking with Salmon Otoliths and Scales. Social Analysis, 61(2), 81-99.

Tsing, A. (2015). The mushroom at the end of the world. On the possibility of life in the capitalist ruins. Princeton University Press.

Viveiros, E. (1996). Os pronomes cosmológicos e o perspectivismo ameríndio. Mana, 2(2), 115-144.

Watson, M. (2016). On Multispecies Mythology: A Critique of Animal Anthropology. Theory, Culture & Society, 33(5), 159-172.

Weinberg, M. (2019). Especies compañeras después de la vida: pensando relaciones humano-perro desde la región surandina. Antípoda. Revista de Antropología y Arqueologia, (36), 139-161.