Sensing Environments: Multimodal Perception and Embodied Experience in Ecological Anthropology

Abstract (English)

The panel explores the intersections of sensory anthropology, embodied knowledge, and environmental perception, examining how sensory experiences shape and are shaped by ecological entanglements. The sensorial turn in anthropology has foregrounded the centrality of multisensory perception in human-environment relations, challenging ocularcentric paradigms and engaging with synesthetic, affective, and embodied ways of knowing. This panel brings together scholars employing sensory methodologies to investigate landscapes, biodiversity, and multispecies interactions, advancing discussions on how sensory experience mediates ecological knowledge.

The panel is structured around three key themes. The first examines the epistemological and methodological implications of sensory anthropology in environmental research, focusing on how embodied and sensory approaches produce not only additional but qualitatively different knowledge about ecosystems. Contributions will interrogate how sensory ethnography captures the entangled relationships between humans, animals, and landscapes, extending beyond representational frameworks to immersive, participatory engagements. This theme also invites discussions on the multimodal ways in which ethnographic film, soundscapes, photography, and other media mediate and expand sensory engagements with environmental transformations.

The second theme explores multispecies ethnography and the sensory dimensions of interspecies communication. Drawing from pastoralist, agrarian, and more-than-human worlds, speakers will discuss how sensory modalities—olfaction, touch, proprioception, and audition—mediate relationships between human and nonhuman beings. How do herders and their animals co-create shared sensory ecologies? What role do non-verbal, affective, and tacit sensory acts play in navigating landscapes and sustaining biodiversity?

The third theme examines environmental transformations through the lens of sensory experience. With climate change, pollution, and biodiversity loss affecting not only material but also perceptual landscapes, the panel will address how sensory methodologies contribute to understanding environmental degradation and resilience. How do changing soundscapes, smellscapes, and tactile engagements with the land signal broader ecological transformations? How do sensory disruptions shape environmental memory, loss, and adaptation?

By engaging with multimodal approaches, this panel highlights the potential of sensory anthropology to contribute to environmental scholarship and policymaking. In recognizing the embodied and multispecies dimensions of knowledge production, the panel challenges dominant extractivist and rationalist frameworks, advocating for attunement to the sensory as a crucial aspect of ecological awareness and sustainability.

We particularly encourage contributions engaging with multimodal approaches, Indigenous and local knowledge systems, and interdisciplinary perspectives that challenge conventional understandings of ecological anthropology through sensory and embodied lenses.