Narrating kinship, care, love and loss in the entangled more than human-animal relations

Abstract

In this paper I engage somatic experience with/in the animal-human dialectic to narrate the relationality of embodiment, subjectivity and encounter. I inquire, through autoethnographic reflection, on the presence of breath sensation, with cross-sensory [synæsthetic] modes of perception. I situate the inclusion of the more than animal-human dialectic into philosophical consideration to write into spaces of uncertainty and query the ways encounters and entanglements with the more than human can reinvigorate dialecticial questioning about the self and social wellbeing. Drawing on the concepts of mindbodying (Ferrando, & Rozzoni, (2024) and interbeing (Thích Nhâ’t Hạnh (1987), I give attention to breath sensation response as an onto-ethical- epistemic re-lating-ship. I situate the use of ordinary moments as a resource for interrogating continuously contestable relational agency and for rethinking my ability to be affected by breath sensation in animal-human entanglements.