Following the More-than-Human. Multimodal Methods and Approaches

A conferência terá lugar nos dias 2 e 3 de outubro no Instituto de Ciências Sociais da Universidade de Lisboa.

By gathering researchers from social sciences, humanities and arts, this international event proposes an innovative and exciting reflection on the ’more-than-human’ and on multimodal methodologies that expand the boundaries of traditional academic work. It will be a privileged space to experiment with new forms of research, writing and creation with the ‘more-than-human,’ affirming the relevance of the ICS-ULisboa as a stage for methodological debates and interdisciplinary dialogue

Sevasti Melissa Nolas will be the keynote speaker, and will talk about her most recent work through the following communication: “How to follow a fibroid: Multimodal approaches and methods to the more-than-human”.

"In 2013, I gave birth to my son by emergency caesarean section (C-section) under general anesthetic after a long labour. While not uncommon where I live—in the United Kingdom around 24% of deliveries result in an emergency C-section and C-sections account for 42% of overall births—the cause of this particular event was the presence in my womb of two benign tumours known, when they happen to be addressed, by their medical names, fibroids or myomas. Fibroids, while not always problematic, affect most women by age 50, are especially prevalent during the reproductive years, and can have considerable impact on a woman’s quality of life. However, what is known about fibroids is more theory than evidence making these fleshy objects mercurial despite the hardness and recalcitrance of their materiality. Easy to miss and hard to ignore, over the years, these bodies within a body have, somewhat unexpectedly, become a muse of sorts to me. Fecund objects, that have preoccupied a large part of my embodiment, fibroids have pushed me towards more creative, sensory, and multimodal ways of thinking and writing as I attempt to sketch out and fill in their more-than-human contours and contexts for a broader audience. The talk—part interdisciplinary scholarly intervention, part performance—draws on my essay ‘Incongruent Gestures’, published by Cache.ch in November 2024 in the collection Radical Health, as well as subsequent work-in-progress in which I further follow the fibroid through creative non-fiction writing, photography, and art as well as attempts to locate it in archives and historical texts. In particular, and taking my cue from the fibroid itself, I explore the ways in which a multimodal approach has not only been necessary but essential in order to better grasp this enigmatic mass that is so resistant to representation in all meanings of that word."

Mais informações

Fonte: https://www.ulisboa.pt/evento/following-more-human-multimodal-methods-and-approaches