The Multispecies Meal

The Multispecies Meal
@ the Society for Cultural Anthropology meetings in Santa Fe
May 7-8, 2010

Artists, anthropologists, and significant others came together to break bread at The Multispecies Salon, a special off-site event at the 2008 meetings of AAA in San Francisco. We shared food in an exercise of being and becoming with Donna Haraway’s companion species. A bestiary of agencies, kinds of relatings, come together in companion species. “Companion comes from the Latin cum panis, ‘with bread,’” she writes. During our meal we ate sourdough bread while Jake Metcalf told us about a microbial culture that crossed the Oregon Trail and then propagated itself on the internet. Acorn mush was prepared by Linda Noel, a Native American poet who told us that she always left some acorns behind “for the deer.”

Artisanal cheeses from nearby Cowgirl Creamery featuring organic milk and ambient as well as freeze-dried microbes from earth, air, and lab, were provided by Heather Paxson. She told us about what she calls “microbiopolitics”, the ways that human systems of ethics and governance bear on the doings of microorganisms.

Other items on our table involved small-scale relationships of mutual care as well as mutual violence. Geographer Jake Kosek had just collected fresh honey from his own beehive and was sporting a swollen hand from a fresh sting. While we sipped dandelion root tea, performance artist Caitlin Berrigan asked that we give blood to a dandelion plant, providing much needed nutrients. The violence was asymmetrical to be sure—bee stings and finger pricks are not equivalent to the large-scale robbery of a hive’s resources, or the uprooting of a plant. Still, this minor violence to human bodies was a reminder that the entangled relations among companion species are often fraught.

Eating a meal in an art gallery turned mundane routine into an opportunity for rumination and reflection. In trying to swallow the products of multispecies labor relations and nested ecological becomings, more than one gallery goer experienced indigestion. The fermented smell of sourdough yeast lingered on the palate, mixing with the bitter taste of dandelion tea and acorn mush.

We will host another multispecies meal at the 2010 meetings of the Society for Cultural Anthropology in Santa Fe. This will be a poster session, of sorts, where people can informally talk about their work and break bread together. People who are already participating in formal paper presentations are welcome to submit their edible organisms for consideration. Entrants should be prepared to bring enough food to share with audience members.

To be included in the session proposal, entrants should simply submit a title for their project by Monday, January 11th, 2010 at noon EST. Address all entries and queries to S. Eben Kirksey (skirksey@pitt.edu). Late entrants will be considered up until the SCA meetings in May.

More information about the Multispecies Salon: www.multispecies-salon.org/