Responding corporeally: Genealogies, imaginings and practices of ecological responsibility in material feminism
Abstract
This chapter explores the relational elements and dynamics of a (neo)material practice of ecological responsibility that takes seriously not-knowing, the unexpected and the unavailable as well as corporeality, imaginations and processes of learning and transformation. By reading together early work in ecofeminism and feminist epistemology with contemporary neo-material approaches, it shows unexpected resonances and genealogies, and develops an understanding of ecological responsibility through situated case studies.
The chapter argues that response-ability in material feminism is a double process of (more-than-human) corporeal responding and accounting, acting and speculating, learning and unlearning. Processes of conscious reflection are necessary but not the starting point for responsible practices that always are corporeally enacted and put at risk.
Collaborations with societal actors are not simply necessary in addition but are inextricably interwoven with research practices that bring forth the actors concerned.