Baum & Leahy: arts and social science research reflections

As part of our fellowship and the Being Human Festival we hosted Gutscapes at the Scottish Storytelling Centre in November 2024. In this public engagement event we explored new imaginaries of the holobiont body through a hybrid format mixing storytelling, science communication and meditative journeys. The multidisciplinary nature of the event intended for a horizontal exchange between sensorial experience, social science research perspectives and feedback from participants. In Joana’s words: “The participatory, democratic impulse is core to our work. We want to share academic knowledges beyond ivory towers, and to share them, not as finished products but as a knowledges-in-the-making; full of facts yes, but facts that won’t hold still. Facts which are also a collective cultural experience, and subject to refinement.”  

Based on Joana’s ongoing research, and within our collaboration, the materially and metaphorically rich medium of mucus (in particular, that which lines the human digestive tract) serves as a useful link to think about multiscalar dynamics. While slime is an intricately structured support system working on a microscale within the body, this substance also reveals narratives of socioeconomic and environmental (in)justices within food systems and accessibility. Can artistic interventions help us comprehend seemingly disparate scales from the political through the biosocial and down to the cellular?  

At CBSS we are deepening our research into the socioeconomic aspects of holobiont health. While visualising and sensorialising personal, bodily elements of the holobiont feels immediately inspiring, visceral and somewhat artistically tangible, a key challenge for us as we incorporate social science perspectives more consciously, is how we can work artistically with less tangible, larger scale social, political and economic systems and influences on and of the human holobiont. In Gutscapes we zoom out to a city level and present the ‘dwelling’ of the industrialised holobiont as a key factor in shaping population health. However, applying a larger-scale systems view and historical factors is a direction we would be keen to explore further. Engaging with multiple CBSS researchers’ work is helping us move towards this more holistic approach.  

Lukas Engelmann, historian of medicine and epidemiology, explores the connection between epidemiological reasoning and the history of knowledge. Speaking with Lukas has brought in questions of how illness, contagion and social dynamics can manifest artistically or even materially. With a shared interest in ‘mapping knowledge’ we discussed how dynamic visual or spatial representations of data could help make different perspectives more tangible. We discussed how these networks might come close to answering the difficult question of what the “materiality of the social sciences” is or can be, and whether experimental projects within or alongside academic practice could be a mutually beneficial part of research communication amongst researchers as well as with the public. We find Lukas’ ongoing experimental digital project “Social Contagion of Social Contagion” (pictured) very interesting – it makes us speculate about all the possible engaging research communication formats which could emerge if artistic methods were embedded more structurally into the practices of academic researchers.

The publication Hormonal Theory: A Rebellious Glossary, assembled by Andrea Ford, cultural and medical anthropologist, with other researchers, is an exciting example of experimental research communication blending critical and artistic perspectives. The book, shaped as a glossary, offers diverse views on hormones and their scientific and biocultural entanglements. Elsa Paulson’s hand-drawn illustrations, depicting molecular structures intertwined with emotions and experiences, add depth and intimacy. This format demonstrates how research can be poetic and engaging, bridging scientific and social dimensions while challenging dominant epistemologies. Andrea’s work inspires us to further explore the interplay of politics, technologies, hormones, and health within the holobiont body.

Who grows and who thrives and who ails and who survives (Sound and health activism)

Laia Ventura, postdoctoral fellow, conducts experimental, sensorial social science research through multidisciplinary collaboration and Brandon LaBelle’s theory of ‘acoustic justice’. Her work examines health, gender, and social inequities, exploring how different groups experience and manage health risks, care, and reproductive rights. In an ongoing arts-research project, Laia collaborates with an interdisciplinary group to explore the intimate and emotional aspects of cervical cancer research, including questions of representation of gender and non-normative genitalia in biomedical science. We find the combination of social science research and sound as communicative media fascinating and poignant – as the nature of sound as a medium feels kindred to the nature of social dynamics – ephemeral, ubiquitous and yet fundamental in shaping our shared realities.

Chase Ledin, Lecturer in Social Science and Medicine, researches the sociology and history of HIV/STI prevention, queer public health, and health activism. His work examines the social dimensions of using doxycycline as post-exposure prophylaxis (DoxyPEP) for STI prevention, highlighting how antibiotics shape perceptions and treatment of the STI-encompassing holobiont. Conversations with Chase broadened our view of the social landscapes influencing holobiont health, including sexual health, sexuality, and pharmaceutical economies. Beyond exploring the intersection of both our research into multi-scalar, multispecies worlds, we also share methods in the use of speculative futuring, participatory work, as well as collaging and zine-making.

Catherine Montgomery, sociologist of science and medicine, examines how scientific knowledge production intersects with clinical care, often through ethnographies of clinical trials. Her research explores how clinical research design and implementation shape knowledge, sociality, and change. Catherine introduced us to "thinking with attachments" (M. de Laet, A. Driessen and E. Vogel) which highlights how care and values influence knowledge creation, challenging the idea that emotional or sensory experiences are separate from objective science. Instead, this concept focuses on the connections and relationships involved in knowledge-making. Reflecting on interdisciplinary collaboration, Catherine noted: “In arts-research collaboration, I’m interested in epistemic and ontological transformation, where what is transformed may be the ‘object’ of research or the relations between research ‘subjects’ and ‘objects.’ The long gut mask already started to change relations in the CBSS seminar room in intriguing ways!”

Research fellow Marie Larsson described to us how the process and exchange of developing illustrations for her thesis in collaboration with artist Frank Rokhlin played a key part in developing the communication of the research – not only through the images but also in shaping how the written communication was formed and articulated. This reflexive exchange between forms of communication and expression became a way of forming the core ideas. Marie describes how the collaborative process “included on-going dialogue about how to best communicate the core ideas of each chapter and the kind of visual that would help convey the tone and feeling I wanted to communicate to readers”. Marie also emphasises how the continuous exercise in communicating her research to a non-researcher helped her refine the core ideas in each chapter, and finally that this collaboration, beyond being academically rewarding, was fun and energising. Collaborations such as these are often self-initiated and not part of established funding politics or ways of working, both within artistic and research practices. We wonder how more frequent exchanges like these could help enrich and diversify research communication, and engage a wider (both academic and nonacademic) audience.

The question of how the social dimensions of the holobiont can be explored through the arts continues to inspire and challenge us. Through exchanges with CBSS researchers and the interdisciplinary methods tested in Gutscapes, we’re starting to sketch the contours of a holobiont figure, more complex, dynamic, and thought-provoking than when we began this fellowship. It demands diverse perspectives – historical, political, technological, and social – while challenging reductionist approaches and subject-object dualism. As we shape new practices grounded in a biosocial understanding of health, the holobiont emerges as a guiding figure: a multispecies symbiosis that highlights diversity as essential and shows how organisms and their environments continuously form one another.

This collage of text and visuals maps our interests during the fellowship as well as our thoughts on arts-research exchanges with various CBSS researchers. The richness of each CBSS researchers’ work has been a source of inspiration, and we hope this post encourages others – researchers and creative practitioners alike – to explore the dynamic intersections of artistic practice and social science research.

Thanks to everyone at CBSS and in particular Joana, Cath and Jenny, for organising this opportunity and inviting us into this fascinating research community.