The question of diversity in interspecific relationships

"La question de la diversité dans les relations interspécifiques : quelques objets et méthodes à partir de l'Asie"

How do SHS, and more specifically anthropology, grasp biological, technical or representational diversities? What types of sources, data and methods are mobilized, and for what results? In this two-voice presentation, Charlotte Marchina (Inalco) and Annabel Vallard (CNRS) will discuss the history of interspecific relations and the interdisciplinary work they are carrying out, in collaboration with the biological and biochemical sciences in particular, one from Mongolia and Siberia, the other from South, Southeast and East Asia, in contact with a variety of non-human animals and diverse, often breeding, relations. The question of methodology will be addressed through the prism of intra- and interspecific diversity as apprehended, conceived and perceived by the practitioners we met in the field and in the archives: what diversity, if any, is sought, with what objectives and by what means? This presentation will provide an opportunity to discuss the initial research results from the three ANR projects Pastodiv, Mobisteppe and Wildsilks.

Charlotte Marchina, an anthropologist, is a lecturer in Mongolian studies at Inalco, a member of the Institut Français de Recherche sur l'Asie de l'Est (IFRAE, UMR 8043) and a Junior Member of the Institut Universitaire de France (IUF). She studies the relationships between herders, their animals and their environment in Mongolia and Southern Siberia.

Annabel Vallard is a research fellow in anthropology at the CNRS, a member of the Centre Asie du Sud-Est (CASE, UMR 8170). She studies textile and mineral socio-technical sectors, and in so doing, relationships to materials and their practitioners.