Covid-19 as a Hyperobject: A Reflection from the Anthropology of Epidemics
This is a reflection on the Covid 19 pandemic and its lessons. It arose in the debate of the seminar “Looking to the future from the World-Ecologies and the fabrics of life” of 2021, within the Network for the Study of Society and Environment (RESMA). Its stimulus comes from the reading of the work...
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| Tipo de recurso: | artículo |
| Estado: | Versión publicada |
| Fecha de publicación: | 2025 |
| País: | Brasil |
| Institución: | Centro Universitário de Anápolis (UniEVANGÉLICA) |
| Repositorio: | Historia Ambiental Latinoamericana y Caribeña |
| Idioma: | español |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:ojs2.www.halacsolcha.org:article/906 |
| Acceso en línea: | https://www.halacsolcha.org/index.php/halac/article/view/906 |
| Access Level: | acceso abierto |
| Palabra clave: | zoonosis posthumanism socio-environmental futures ontological turn hyperobject zoonósis poshumanismo futuros socioambientales giro ontológico hiperobjeto |
| Sumario: | This is a reflection on the Covid 19 pandemic and its lessons. It arose in the debate of the seminar “Looking to the future from the World-Ecologies and the fabrics of life” of 2021, within the Network for the Study of Society and Environment (RESMA). Its stimulus comes from the reading of the work of the English philosopher Timothy Morton and the review of texts that open us to contemporary Amerindian thought and post-humanism. The SARS CoV-2 pandemic as a hyperobject is the marker of an era characterized by the paradoxical contraction/expansion of the web of life, in which “the end of the world” becomes the backbone of the environmental ethical commitment of a consciousness so far obfuscated by the hypocrisy of believing itself superior and not recognizing itself as a participant in the debacle. The large-scale transformation of wild environments into areas of exploitation gives rise to the emergence of lethal zoonoses with unpredictable consequences. This is the background of an environmental history that leads to the Anthropocene/Capitalocene. The fear of going outdoors is the time of acid rain, polluted air and the other terrors of modernity that force us into confinement. The ontological separation between nature and ourselves provides us with an apparent security. We believe that science and technology can solve all the problems we have caused, but we run urgently for palliative solutions (vaccines). In this brief essay the metaphor of the pandemic as a hyperobject is summoned to think about socio-environmental futures. |
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