Abstract

ABSTRACT As a welcome contribution to the burgeoning literature addressing the promising intersection between biology and ontology in contemporary continental philosophy, Marjolein Oele's E-Co-Affectivity: Exploring Pathos at Life's Material Interfaces investigates the themes of affectivity and life in their multiple and divergent forms: photosynthesis and growth in plants, touch and trauma in bird feathers, the ontogenesis of human life through the placenta, the bare interface of human skin, and the porous materiality of soil. By seeking out new unexplored territory through her remarkably erudite interventions into the life sciences, Oele critically interrogates the relationship between affectivity and materiality to uncover their shared depth and potential for cultivating ecological interdependence, ethical responsibility, and a renewed political commitment to the local spaces and places constituting e-co-affective communities.