Doctoral defence: Daina Pupkeviciute "Relationships in the Context of Crisis: Earth, Time and Generativity in the Roya Valley"

Summary: This research project looks at how humans, nonhuman animals, plants and landscapes are bound together in the Roya Valley in France, and how relationships that humans have with the nonhumans shape experiences of storm Alex (2020) as well as global climate change. Using ethnography, interviews, sensory methods, and artistic practice, alongside historical and environmental analysis, I explore local peasant practices of multispecies care, adaptation, and coexistence with nonhuman animals.
Across three articles, I approach the valley from different angles. Article I examines “heterotopias”— different, but overlapping spaces imagined, performed and dwelled by human and nonhuman inhabitants of Roya—revealing tensions between long-term residents, newcomers, and those drawn by the valley’s unique sense of connectedness. Article II reflects on methods: in a charged, post-disaster field, I drew on my artistic practice for grounding and to create an exhibition that made the interwoven nature of climate disaster tangible. Article III focuses on care for sheep and wolves, showing how these practices connect to politics, environmental policies, and competing ideas of what—and who—is worth caring for. In the umbrella text, I explore a web of relationships in the Roya Valley built on care, mutual responsibility, and interdependence. I focus on practices of attunement, response-ability, and responsiveness, grounded in the importance of understanding landscapes through intergenerational multispecies relationalities.