Week 8 ✩ Vibrant Matter

This week, the reading material was “Vibrant Matter” by Jane Bennett. Her work explores the subject of objects having some sort of agency or liveliness, as if they’re on the same conscious level as living beings.

The term “vital materialism” explores this similar concept, essentially stressing the fact that all matter has the energy to influence the world around it. Everything has the ability to act, affect & be affected. In retrospect, vital materialism provides a more ecological/ethical way of interacting with our environment & the objects within it – if we recognise & respect the role of all materials around us, we see them as participants within our live rather than passive. However, many people argue that vital materialism is quite radical as it challenges the beliefs about the nature of life & the relationships between humans & the environment. Western ideology is that only humans or animals have the ability to act with purpose, so including objects within that bracket is absurd. This concept questions the boundary between humans & nature, as well as disrupting hierarchies by placing nature on the same level.

I find this idea a really interesting way of viewing the environment & it’s a great way of respecting it, however I can see the point that objects shouldn’t be placed on the same level as living things. While it’s true that objects can affect us whether we see it or not, I just find it odd to view them as “living things”. I can see how this view can positively affect my environment in the future as if everyone treats objects with “respect”

in the same way as other beings, people will pay more attention to waste & pollution.

Bennett also talks about “assemblages” which are a set of collective interactions between humans & non-human components. All influence one another – a good example of this would be a city, or a park (humans, animals, as well as buildings, plants, air, man made paths, cars etc.). Each component holds its own energy & are completely different, yet whe they’re together they make something new. Assemblages are an important part of her theorising as they show agency isn’t limited to individual things but can be evident in the relationship between things. An example of this is a black out – it’s not completely caused by power lines/weather conditions but by the interaction between weather/buildings/infrastructure. This concept was hard to wrap my head around at first, however I slowly began to understand – everything does have the power to affect & be affected & I find it interesting that a group of simple objects or beings can make no sense individually, but together they create something new.

(Pictured right) Sketch of people in a city crossing the road 2024, Natalie Foster.

Vibrant matter presents a lot of eye opening ideas, it has definitely changed the way that I view the world now – all objects & materials affect us in our day to day life, so it’s important to pay mind to them, their processes & where they could possibly end up.

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Bennett, J. (2010). Vibrant Matter: a Political Ecology of Things. Durham: Duke University Press.