"What Viruses Know About Politics?" Filipa Ramos

In 2014, social theorist Brian Massumi authored What Animals Teach Us About Politics?, "an extended thought experiment in what an animal politics can be". Seven years later, humanity's belonging to the natural realm has never been so asserted, as human-induced climate change renders the entanglement of causes and consequences even more visible and epidemics expose how intimate are the transactions that continuously take place across different life forms. If the logic of "us" [humans] learning from "them" [animals] needs to be questioned alongside other extractivist legitimisations, it may also be time to widen the reflection on other-than-human politics to understand what other politics and ethics can living and non-living beings shatter, inaugurate and reveal. In this talk, I will explore the possibilities and limits of viral political wisdom and discuss what they disclose of our present and near future.