Wit(H)Nessing The Catastrophe: More-Than-Human Politics And Anthropology In The Anthropocene

Official URL: https://risc01.sabanciuniv.edu/record=b3201365

Acknowledging the characteristics and complexities of the environmental catastrophe of the Anthropocene, this thesis aims to focus on the politics of witnessing by theorizing more-than-human perspectives of it. Calling this the theory of wit(h)nessing and describing it as an unfolding experience, this thesis discovers the literature on witnessing by interpreting it through the anthropology of more-thanhuman and theories of ontological anthropology. Focusing on the literature that explains and builds ethics through the events of Shoah, the thesis proposes to define an ethics of the catastrophe of Anthropocene and through the theory of wit(h)nessing aims to define an ethics that considers vulnerability and response-ability. Further aiming to define what a political animal is, through this ethics, this thesis aims to define and figure ways of living well together, of the possibilities of more-than-human politics through wit(h)nessing.