Silencing/Unsilencing Nature: A ‘Lupocentric’ Remediation of Animal-Nature Relationships

Abstract

This article is theoretically grounded in a reflection on the discursive-material knot, which uses a macro-(con)textual approach to discourse, but also allocates a non-hierarchical position to the material, recognizing its agency. The article uses the ontological model to further theorize the discursive-material struggles of, and over, nature, and in particular of non-human animals. These theoretical frameworks are then deployed to reflect on the “Silencing/Unsilencing Nature” project (and its diverse subprojects). This is an arts-based research project which aims to unpack the discursive-material relationship between humans and nature, and how nature often has been silenced, focusing on the position of the wolf in the zoo assemblage, and how these animals are discursively and materially entrapped. At the same time, the “Silencing/Unsilencing Nature” project investigates how this situation can be changed, and how their voices can still be made audible, gain more strength and become further unsilenced.