Tropical Materialisms: Toward Decolonial Poetics, Practices and Possibilities

Tropical Materialisms concur on at least three things: humans are always entangled with non-human/material agents; such entanglement is necessary for any creative act to take place; and these same entanglements allow us to interrogate and re-evaluate preconceived notions about the world. This Speci...

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Main Authors: Christian Jil R. Benitez, Anita Lundberg
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: James Cook University 2022-10-01
Series:eTropic: electronic journal of studies in the tropics
Subjects:
Online Access:https://journals.jcu.edu.au/etropic/article/view/3929
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author Christian Jil R. Benitez
Anita Lundberg
author_facet Christian Jil R. Benitez
Anita Lundberg
author_sort Christian Jil R. Benitez
collection DOAJ
description Tropical Materialisms concur on at least three things: humans are always entangled with non-human/material agents; such entanglement is necessary for any creative act to take place; and these same entanglements allow us to interrogate and re-evaluate preconceived notions about the world. This Special Issue aligns itself with the fields of new materialism and posthumanism. What is particularly exciting is the opportunity to rearticulate these fields in tropical terms, that is, with scholarly and creative practices from and about the tropical world. This focus is crucial given that current scholarship in new materialism and posthumanism predominantly comes from European temperate contexts and is informed by Western philosophies. In order to decolonize the ontological turn, this Special Issue recognises not only that colonial knowledge systems impacted the tropics, but also that matter’s liveliness was and is well understood in Indigenous cosmologies, ancient philosophies and ‘animist materialism’. The papers collected together in this special issue offers materialisms informed by decolonizing intuitions. They variously demonstrate how the tropics, as geographic zone and as pertaining to poetics (via "tropes"), can theoretically inform and historically problematise new materialism and posthumanism. They offer new vocabularies through which discourses on "tropical materialism" may be initiated; and a cartography of practices across disciplinary fields which demonstrate what this "tropical materialism" may be. The Special Issue collection it itself a form of poiesis: a creative engagement with the world.
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spelling doaj.art-6acd4e2df56946c6827db4784a4c226f2022-12-22T03:38:15ZengJames Cook UniversityeTropic: electronic journal of studies in the tropics1448-29402022-10-0121210.25120/etropic.21.2.2022.3929Tropical Materialisms: Toward Decolonial Poetics, Practices and PossibilitiesChristian Jil R. Benitez0Anita Lundberg1Ateneo de Manila University, the Philippines & Chulalongkorn University, Thailand James Cook University, Australia Tropical Materialisms concur on at least three things: humans are always entangled with non-human/material agents; such entanglement is necessary for any creative act to take place; and these same entanglements allow us to interrogate and re-evaluate preconceived notions about the world. This Special Issue aligns itself with the fields of new materialism and posthumanism. What is particularly exciting is the opportunity to rearticulate these fields in tropical terms, that is, with scholarly and creative practices from and about the tropical world. This focus is crucial given that current scholarship in new materialism and posthumanism predominantly comes from European temperate contexts and is informed by Western philosophies. In order to decolonize the ontological turn, this Special Issue recognises not only that colonial knowledge systems impacted the tropics, but also that matter’s liveliness was and is well understood in Indigenous cosmologies, ancient philosophies and ‘animist materialism’. The papers collected together in this special issue offers materialisms informed by decolonizing intuitions. They variously demonstrate how the tropics, as geographic zone and as pertaining to poetics (via "tropes"), can theoretically inform and historically problematise new materialism and posthumanism. They offer new vocabularies through which discourses on "tropical materialism" may be initiated; and a cartography of practices across disciplinary fields which demonstrate what this "tropical materialism" may be. The Special Issue collection it itself a form of poiesis: a creative engagement with the world. https://journals.jcu.edu.au/etropic/article/view/3929Tropical MaterialismsAnimist materialismontological turnMaterial Poeticsdecolonizationpoiesis
spellingShingle Christian Jil R. Benitez
Anita Lundberg
Tropical Materialisms: Toward Decolonial Poetics, Practices and Possibilities
eTropic: electronic journal of studies in the tropics
Tropical Materialisms
Animist materialism
ontological turn
Material Poetics
decolonization
poiesis
title Tropical Materialisms: Toward Decolonial Poetics, Practices and Possibilities
title_full Tropical Materialisms: Toward Decolonial Poetics, Practices and Possibilities
title_fullStr Tropical Materialisms: Toward Decolonial Poetics, Practices and Possibilities
title_full_unstemmed Tropical Materialisms: Toward Decolonial Poetics, Practices and Possibilities
title_short Tropical Materialisms: Toward Decolonial Poetics, Practices and Possibilities
title_sort tropical materialisms toward decolonial poetics practices and possibilities
topic Tropical Materialisms
Animist materialism
ontological turn
Material Poetics
decolonization
poiesis
url https://journals.jcu.edu.au/etropic/article/view/3929
work_keys_str_mv AT christianjilrbenitez tropicalmaterialismstowarddecolonialpoeticspracticesandpossibilities
AT anitalundberg tropicalmaterialismstowarddecolonialpoeticspracticesandpossibilities