Living and researching between university and terreiro: cosmopolitics of encounter, contamination and care with Oropouche

Abstract

A group of professors, students and members of a Candomblé house were infected by the Oropouche virus during fieldwork at the Ilê Axé Omin Ota Odara, located in the countryside of the state of Rio de Janeiro. This experience led us to theorize the cosmopolitics of encounter, contamination and care in composition with the virus. More than an unforeseen event, the virus presents itself as a presence that reconfigures our bodies and the research practices and collaborations in which we engage. Based on this radical crossing, we discuss how meshworks of care, traditional knowledge and multispecies relations compose an ecology of cosmopolitical practices that challenge the paradigms of control and development. As researchers collaborating with the community of a Candomblé house, we all found ourselves transformed into objects of clinical research in infectology. In this work, we consider how this experience calls us to cultivate ethical and responsive commitments to life and to research, in worlds undergoing violent transformations.

Keywords: Anthropocene, Care and Contamination, Oropouche Fever, Making-with, Design, Architecture