The many ethnographic faces of the parasite

Description

Convenors

• Michael Degani (University of Cambridge)
• Grace Zhou (Maynooth University)

Summary

Drawing on an improbable mix of philosophy, folklore, theology, communications theory, and behavioural ecology, Michel Serres (1982) offered a theory of the Parasite as any agent, human or beyond, that acts as an interrupting third, perturbing a connection between two (or more) relata. From noise that garbles a channel, to an uninvited guest that shows up for dinner, to a sovereign that expropriates the surplus of its people, to a species that degrades an environment, the parasite stands for all actors who live off–and upon–others. And yet just who is the parasite and who is the host is not always so clear, and often a matter of framing.

We propose that in the parasite anthropologists may find a powerful tool with which to theorise a world of increasingly complex cohabitations, in which such frames themselves exert a powerful organising force. The concept has proven useful for STS and media studies to theorise moments of breakdown and interruption (Brown 2002; Lezaun 2011; Fisher 2020; Wolfe 2021). Uptake in anthropology has been comparatively rare, though it has been used to suggestively rethink assumptions of economic reciprocity (Kockelman 2010; Shryock 2019) or ecological equilibrium (Kirksey 2015; Chao 2021). More broadly, the parasite, which emphasises the reversibility of guest/host or exploiter/exploited, may also be a useful ‘portable analytic’ (Boyer and Howe 2015) across a range of ethnographic contexts. It offers a provocation to consider the ambivalent ethos of co-option, over-intimacy, reappropriation, or adaptation from within a system, in contrast to the purifying imaginaries of redemptive liberalism, overt resistance, and fugitivity. Thinking with parasites brings together questions across economic, political, social, and ecological domains, and we invite papers that explore this proposition with ethnographic nuance. How might the parasite provide a common framework for subjects as varied as roadblocks, toxic exposure, human-animal relations, and ‘surplus’ populations? How might it help develop an ethnography of disgust, resentment, and other ‘ugly’ affects?

We also take seriously critiques of Serres’ framework for not dealing with the specificities of how parasitic relationality interfaces with structures of oppression and privilege (Snyder 2013), and invite critical reflections on the ways that accusations of parasitism are often gendered and racialized. Who or what is deemed parasitic, and what do these ascriptions reveal about normative judgements of worth, or about the work that is needed to maintain closed systems of power? Finally, how might understanding ascriptions of parasitism as an admission (or disavowal) of fundamental entanglement and mutual dependence open up new avenues for transformation and emergence?

---

If you have specific accessibility needs for this event please get in touch. We will do our best to accommodate any requests.

Supported by: