Noticing and the arts of attentiveness

The question of how to understand, notice and observe other-than-human beings is an endlessly intriguing challenge, and one that is vital to sustainable futures. This question takes us into deep considerations about ethics and knowing. Is it ever possible to overcome the fundamental otherness that characterizes our relationship to other-than-human species?

The relations between species in a multispecies world are characterized by multiplicity. This means that we are dealing with a question much broader than just communication between two individuals of different species (for example a human and a dog). Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing approaches the multispecies world through the concept of assemblage. Assemblage is a heterogeneous collection formed by different elements gathering together. An assemblage can be, for example, a child’s play at the daycare center’s sandbox, gathering together different materials (sand, weather, air), bodies (human and bacterial bodies), discourses (educational discourses) and much more.

Multispecies assemblages, and the role and agency of the other-than-humans in them, are difficult to notice because of the human-centered worldview we have adopted.

Thom van Dooren and their colleagues (2016) speak about arts of attentiveness in connection with multispecies research. Through attentiveness, mere noticing becomes a mode of observing that combines both noticing and producing meaningful responses. Thus, attentiveness is about politics and ethics. As we get to know other beings, we begin to perceive how our world is full of diversity and differences, and, on a fundamental level, still shared.

Multispecies scholars talk about a passionate attitude, when immersing in more-than-human worlds. In “passionate immersion”, a researcher, while doing the research, lets themselves be affected as well. Immersion enriches the traditional unidirectional relation between the knowing human and the other-than-human object of knowing. This, in turn, opens up more possibilities for nurturing and care. Yet, importantly: immersion into attentiveness is not merely about pleasant vibes. Multispecies relations are not only comfortable or life affirming.

Vinciane Despret says that good questions seldom come to an indifferent observer. This is why multispecies research cannot be based on neutrality and the researcher/researched separation. Immersing requires the researcher to become part of the assemblage under exploration. It also highlights that even if the researcher is a participant, they are only a participant, and not more.