Fermenting Feminism

"Fermenting Feminism brings together artists whose work responds to what it means to bring fermentation and feminism into the same critical space. These are works that approach fermentation through intersectional and trans-inclusive feminist frameworks, and works that approach feminisms through the metaphor and material practice of fermentation. As both a metaphor and a physical process, fermentation embodies bioavailability and accessibility, preservation and transformation, inter-species symbiosis and coevolution, biodiversity and futurity, harm reduction and care." -- p. [1]

The Beaker phenomenon and the genomic transformation of northwest Europe

From around 2750 to 2500 bc, Bell Beaker pottery became widespread across western and central Europe, before it disappeared between 2200 and 1800 bc. The forces that propelled its expansion are a matter of long-standing debate, and there is support for both cultural diffusion and migration having a role in this process. Here we present genome-wide data from 400 Neolithic, Copper Age and Bronze Age Europeans, including 226 individuals associated with Beaker-complex artefacts. We detected limited genetic affinity between Beaker-complex-associated individuals from Iberia and central Europe, and thus exclude migration as an important mechanism of spread between these two regions. However, migration had a key role in the further dissemination of the Beaker complex. We document this phenomenon most clearly in Britain, where the spread of the Beaker complex introduced high levels of steppe-related ancestry and was associated with the replacement of approximately 90% of Britain’s gene pool within a few hundred years, continuing the east-to-west expansion that had brought steppe-related ancestry into central and northern Europe over the previous centuries

Effect of angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor and angiotensin receptor blocker initiation on organ support-free days in patients hospitalized with COVID-19

IMPORTANCE Overactivation of the renin-angiotensin system (RAS) may contribute to poor clinical outcomes in patients with COVID-19. Objective To determine whether angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitor or angiotensin receptor blocker (ARB) initiation improves outcomes in patients hospitalized for COVID-19. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS In an ongoing, adaptive platform randomized clinical trial, 721 critically ill and 58 non–critically ill hospitalized adults were randomized to receive an RAS inhibitor or control between March 16, 2021, and February 25, 2022, at 69 sites in 7 countries (final follow-up on June 1, 2022). INTERVENTIONS Patients were randomized to receive open-label initiation of an ACE inhibitor (n = 257), ARB (n = 248), ARB in combination with DMX-200 (a chemokine receptor-2 inhibitor; n = 10), or no RAS inhibitor (control; n = 264) for up to 10 days. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES The primary outcome was organ support–free days, a composite of hospital survival and days alive without cardiovascular or respiratory organ support through 21 days. The primary analysis was a bayesian cumulative logistic model. Odds ratios (ORs) greater than 1 represent improved outcomes. RESULTS On February 25, 2022, enrollment was discontinued due to safety concerns. Among 679 critically ill patients with available primary outcome data, the median age was 56 years and 239 participants (35.2%) were women. Median (IQR) organ support–free days among critically ill patients was 10 (–1 to 16) in the ACE inhibitor group (n = 231), 8 (–1 to 17) in the ARB group (n = 217), and 12 (0 to 17) in the control group (n = 231) (median adjusted odds ratios of 0.77 [95% bayesian credible interval, 0.58-1.06] for improvement for ACE inhibitor and 0.76 [95% credible interval, 0.56-1.05] for ARB compared with control). The posterior probabilities that ACE inhibitors and ARBs worsened organ support–free days compared with control were 94.9% and 95.4%, respectively. Hospital survival occurred in 166 of 231 critically ill participants (71.9%) in the ACE inhibitor group, 152 of 217 (70.0%) in the ARB group, and 182 of 231 (78.8%) in the control group (posterior probabilities that ACE inhibitor and ARB worsened hospital survival compared with control were 95.3% and 98.1%, respectively). CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE In this trial, among critically ill adults with COVID-19, initiation of an ACE inhibitor or ARB did not improve, and likely worsened, clinical outcomes. TRIAL REGISTRATION ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT0273570

Dimethyl fumarate in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19 (RECOVERY): a randomised, controlled, open-label, platform trial

Dimethyl fumarate (DMF) inhibits inflammasome-mediated inflammation and has been proposed as a treatment for patients hospitalised with COVID-19. This randomised, controlled, open-label platform trial (Randomised Evaluation of COVID-19 Therapy [RECOVERY]), is assessing multiple treatments in patients hospitalised for COVID-19 (NCT04381936, ISRCTN50189673). In this assessment of DMF performed at 27 UK hospitals, adults were randomly allocated (1:1) to either usual standard of care alone or usual standard of care plus DMF. The primary outcome was clinical status on day 5 measured on a seven-point ordinal scale. Secondary outcomes were time to sustained improvement in clinical status, time to discharge, day 5 peripheral blood oxygenation, day 5 C-reactive protein, and improvement in day 10 clinical status. Between 2 March 2021 and 18 November 2021, 713 patients were enroled in the DMF evaluation, of whom 356 were randomly allocated to receive usual care plus DMF, and 357 to usual care alone. 95% of patients received corticosteroids as part of routine care. There was no evidence of a beneficial effect of DMF on clinical status at day 5 (common odds ratio of unfavourable outcome 1.12; 95% CI 0.86-1.47; p = 0.40). There was no significant effect of DMF on any secondary outcome

Conspiring to be Convivial: Fermentation and Living with the Microbial Other

Microbes live inside, on, and around us at all times. While humans and microbes have been historically interdependent, the fact remains that microbes can live without us-humans while the reverse remains untrue. Given our futures, how do we-humans (continue to) live with microbial life when we cannot easily communicate with them? This project examines the hands-on material practices of fermentation to analyze how we engage with microbial life when they are both invisible and incomprehensible. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork across three sites in Japan, I worked with(in) places like sake breweries and creameries as a way to study microbes, their ecosystems, and the people who repeatedly attend to them. Specifically, I foregrounded a multispecies approach, emphasizing sensory data and feminist modes of relationality to theorize how we connect across species, scales, and stakes. My analyses show that fermentation can be framed as an ongoing dialogue with microbial life through space-making and attunement. Space-making refers to the iterative practice of arranging environments to make them hospitable and conducive for microbial others. This displaces the human-fermenter as one of many participants in what I call the ambient. Building these spaces is predicated on the practice of attunement, which I examine as an embodied, rhythmic, and spatial awareness in a multispecies call-and-response. Combined, these practices connect beings that mutually enable one another towards convivial relations, which grapple with the ethical questions of how to work-with, even use, microbial life. These practices rewrite fermentation as a contingent process (not a causal one) in which relations emerge through repeated encounters. Situated at the nexus of critical communications theory and feminist technoscience, this project contributes to the urgent need to theorize ways of communicating across incommensurable differences without the triplicate offenses of speaking for the microbial other, presuming symbiotic benefit, or using abstractions to absolve ourselves from having to reckon with a perilous present. Microbes do not just exist “out there” or “in theory”; they literally and figuratively thread through our bodies, environments, and social spheres regardless of whether we are conscious of these tetherings or not

Communicating With the Microbial Other: Reorienting humans and microbes in polylogue

ABSTRACT: What does it mean to communicate with the trillions of microbial beings that comprise our bodies and surroundings? Microbes are incomprehensible—or so the narrative has been to sidestep an engagement with them. Additionally, microbes are “invisible,” and unlike other organisms, they are ubiquitous, unruly, and necessary for our thriving. This paper uses other examples of communicating with incomprehensible others (e.g., machines, infants, and other species) for insights on how to still engage in communicating with microbes. To theorize human-microbe communications, this paper specifically focuses on fermentation practices to disentangle the material-discursive and ethico-political aspects of human-microbe encounters through food (e.g., pickling, breadbaking, sake-brewing). It draws on the work of John Durham Peters to reorient humanmicrobe communications towards polylogue, where many speak and many hear simultaneously. Doing so shifts the problem away from assessing the accuracy of the intended microbial message (“what are they saying?”) and towards one of assuming a self-reflexive disposition (“how can I position myself to best ‘hear’ what is being said?”). It is a reorientation of how we-humans might attune to and listen for others’ cues. The issue of incomprehensibility, then, might be better held as a reality to accept than a challenge to overcome, and that accepting this reality comes with a set of responsibilities for living in an imbricated, more-than-human, highly microbial world. This paper contributes to both food studies and communication studies by expanding the analytical frame beyond representations and significations of food/microbes in media to instead analyze how ferments mediate relations. Available at: http://gmj-canadianedition.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/02_Hey-Volume-15-issue-1_Paper-FINAL.pd

Catalysts of Open Education in Colorado : A Qualitative Study of Enabling Forces in OE Momentum

What are/were the catalysts that enabled Open Education (OE) momentum in Colorado, and what can be gleaned from its origin stories? Using a mix of qualitative methods (e.g. interviews, narrative analysis, discourse analysis), this paper maps the forces, both actual and imagined, that enabled OE to flourish across the state. This paper locates patterns specific to Colorado and analyzes the interdependent and interpersonal aspects of the OE movement/philosophy there. It arrives at the conclusion that two themes in particular (state-level support and community characteristics) contribute to Colorado’s reputation as an OE leader. Rather than view these as distinct forces, the two themes entwine and synergistically enhance the other. This paper contributes to growing research in the area of second-order OE thriving and sustainability. It makes the case that, while identifying barriers to OE can assist with action-oriented research, identifying the enabling forces can also offer a more nuanced understanding in a particular place: less of the bad is one tactic, more of the good is another.What are/were the catalysts that enabled Open Education (OE) momentum in Colorado, and what can be gleaned from its origin stories? Using a mix of qualitative methods this paper maps the forces—both actual and imagined—that enabled OE to flourish across the state. This paper locates patterns specific to Colorado and analyzes the interdependent and interpersonal aspects of the OE movement and philosophy in that state. It arrives at the conclusion that two elements in particular (state-level support and community characteristics) contribute to Colorado’s reputation as an OE leader. Rather than view these as distinct forces, the two themes entwine and synergistically enhance the other. This paper contributes to growing research in the area of second-order OE thriving and sustainability. It makes the case that, while identifying barriers to OE can assist with action-oriented research, identifying the enabling forces can also offer a more nuanced understanding in a particular place: less of the bad is one tactic, more of the good is another.Peer reviewe

Symbiosis and the steward : reading human-microbe relationships and restorying convivial futures

he human-microbe relationship spans millennia of use, hope, and tension. And the recent discovery of microbiomes and their uncanny influence on human agency is re-storying what it means to be human in a microbial world. What if the stories we inherited about human-microbe thriving were obsolete, and what new ways of storying can we imagine with microbes? The roles we play in these stories—like that of a stewarding or partnering with microbes—can lead to certain power configurations and assumptions about control. At the same time, stories of symbiosis, or ‘living with’ microbes, can assume mutual benefit where there is none and obfuscate other configurations such as commensalism and parasitism. It seems then that our pre-existing attempts to describe the human-microbe relationship butt against stories of multispecies survival. Conviviality may be one way to re-story the human-microbe relationship as it centres eating relations without presuming humans as the only ones feasting. This essay attempts a critical reading of concepts such as symbiosis and stewardship by comparing examples from media, philosophy, and popular discourse to analyse how we imagine, represent, and live with microbes in the contemporary moment, given our entangled futures.The human-microbe relationship spans millennia of use, hope, and tension. And the recent discovery of microbiomes and their uncanny influence on human agency is re-storying what it means to be human in a microbial world. What if the stories we inherited about human-microbe thriving were obsolete, and what new ways of storying can we imagine with microbes? The roles we play in these stories—like that of a stewarding or partnering with microbes—can lead to certain power configurations and assumptions about control. At the same time, stories of symbiosis, or ‘living with’ microbes, can assume mutual benefit where there is none and obfuscate other configurations such as commensalism and parasitism. It seems then that our pre-existing attempts to describe the human-microbe relationship butt against stories of multispecies survival. Conviviality may be one way to re-story the human-microbe relationship as it centres eating relations without presuming humans as the only ones feasting. This essay attempts a critical reading of concepts such as symbiosis and stewardship by comparing examples from media, philosophy, and popular discourse to analyse how we imagine, represent, and live with microbes in the contemporary moment, given our entangled futures.Peer reviewe

Symbiosis and the Steward: Reading human-microbe relationships and restorying convivial futures

ABSTRACT: The human-microbe relationship spans millennia of use, hope, and tension. And the recent discovery of microbiomes and their uncanny influence on human agency is re-storying what it means to be human in a microbial world. What if the stories we inherited about human-microbe thriving were obsolete, and what new ways of storying can we imagine with microbes? The roles we play in these stories—like that of a stewarding or partnering with microbes—can lead to certain power configurations and assumptions about control. At the same time, stories of symbiosis, or ‘living with’ microbes, can assume mutual benefit where there is none and obfuscate other configurations such as commensalism and parasitism. It seems then that our pre-existing attempts to describe the human-microbe relationship butt against stories of multispecies survival. Conviviality may be one way to re-story the human-microbe relationship as it centres eating relations without presuming humans as the only ones feasting. This essay attempts a critical reading of concepts such as symbiosis and stewardship by comparing examples from media, philosophy, and popular discourse to analyse how we imagine, represent, and live with microbes in the contemporary moment, given our entangled futures. Available at: https://ejournals.epublishing.ekt.gr/index.php/synthesis/article/view/3571

Attunement and Multispecies Communication in Fermentation

Terada Honke is a natural sake brewery that utilizes practices like call-and-response and work song to coordinate its fermentation processes across human and microbial participants. I call attention to the concept of attunement, which is the ability to notice, apprehend, and connect with others in meaningful response. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, I explain why brewers must attune to the social, spatial, and temporal scales of life within the brewhouse, including the microbes who remain invisible to the brewers. I then analyze how the brewers practice attunement by attending to the relations between (inter-), within (intra-), and outside of (extra-) their bodies. These practices enable brewers to practice an embodied relationality that spans multiple scales and multiple species, or what others have called response-ability. I argue that this form of attunement could extend the idea of collective ethics to include microbial others and help rewrite the metaphysics of what it means to be human