Social & Cultural Geography
ISSN: 1464-9365 (Print) 1470-1197 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rscg20
Microbiomes as companion species: an
exploration of dis- and re-entanglements with the
microbial self
Alice Beck
To cite this article: Alice Beck (2019): Microbiomes as companion species: an exploration
of dis- and re-entanglements with the microbial self, Social & Cultural Geography, DOI:
10.1080/14649365.2019.1593490
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/14649365.2019.1593490
Published online: 21 Mar 2019.
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SOCIAL & CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY
https://doi.org/10.1080/14649365.2019.1593490
Microbiomes as companion species: an exploration of disand re-entanglements with the microbial self
Alice Beck
School of Geographical Sciences, University of Bristol, University road, Bristol, UK
ABSTRACT
ARTICLE HISTORY
Research within the natural sciences is increasingly revealing the
importance that microbial life has for human functioning. Referred
to as the microbiome, the unique selection of microbial life that
harbours inside the body affects human behaviours. This paper
contrasts the more simplistic practices and imaginations associated with ‘good’ and ‘bad’ microbes with the more nuanced
perspective offered by research with FMT users and explores
what these sources say of a human microbe relationship.
Through an engagement with Haraway’s concept of companion
species this paper first explores how a good/bad binary of microbial life is reproduced through cleaning, probiotic advertising and
the technologies of antibiotics. It points to the consequent warping of the complexities of microbial life through such representations. It then engages with FMT users’ experiences of FMT to
develop Haraway’s concept of embodied communication to corporeal communication, which describes a mode of relating
between FMT users and their microbiomes. The paper then offers
corporeal communication as an alternative conceptual tool that
can be used by those that have not undergone FMT to better
understand and appreciate the microbial self.
Received 14 December 2017
Accepted 18 February 2019
KEYWORDS
Faecal microbiota
transplantation; microbiome;
companion species;
microbiopolitics
MOTS CLÉS
Transplantation de
Microbiote Fécal;
microbiome; espèces
compagnes;
microbiopolitique
PALABRAS CLAVE
Trasplante de microbiota
fecal; Microbioma; Especies
acompañantes;
Microbiopolítica
Les microbiomes en tant qu’espèces compagnes:
une exploration des désenchevêtrements et des
réenchevêtrements avec le moi microbien
La recherche en sciences naturelles révèle de plus en plus l’importance qu’a la vie microbienne dans le fonctionnement humain.
Appelé microbiome, cette sélection unique de vie microbienne qui
siège dans le corps affecte les comportements humains. Cet article
contraste les pratiques et imaginations plus simplistes associées aux
« bons » et « mauvais » microbes avec la perspective plus nuancée
proposée par la recherche avec les adeptes de la Transplantation de
Microbiote Fécal et il explore ce que ces sources disent au sujet du
rapport entre les humains et les microbes. Grâce à un travail avec le
concept de Haraway des espèces compagnes, cet article explore en
premier lieu comment une bonne/mauvaise scissiparité de la vie
microbienne se reproduit à travers le nettoyage, la publicité probiotique et les technologies des antibiotiques. Il montre du doigt la
CONTACT Alice Beck
Alice.Beck@Bristol.ac.uk
road, Bristol BS8 1SS, United Kingdom
School of Geographical Sciences, University of Bristol, University
© 2019 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
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déformation des complexités de la vie microbienne à travers de
telles représentations. En deuxième lieu, l’article utilise les
expériences de TMF des utilisateurs de TMF pour développer le
concept de la communication incarnée envers la communication
corporelle, qui décrit un mode de relation entre les utilisateurs de
TMF et leurs microbiomes. Cet article propose enfin la communication corporelle comme un outil alternatif conceptuel qui peut être
utilisé par ceux qui n’ont pas subi de TMF pour mieux comprendre
et apprécier le moi microbien.
Los microbiomas como especies que acompañan:
una exploración de los desenlaces y reencuentros
con el yo microbiano
La investigación dentro de las ciencias naturales está revelando
cada vez más la importancia que tiene la vida microbiana para el
funcionamiento humano. Conocido como el microbioma, la
selección única de vida microbiana que se alberga dentro del
cuerpo afecta el comportamiento humano. Este artículo contrasta
las prácticas e imaginaciones más simplistas asociadas con microbios ‘buenos’ y ‘malos’ con la perspectiva más matizada que ofrece
la investigación con usuarios de FMT (Transplante de microbiota
fecal) y explora lo que estas fuentes dicen de una relación microbiana humana. A través de un compromiso con el concepto de
Haraway de especies acompañantes, este artículo explora cómo se
reproduce un binario bueno/malo de la vida microbiana a través de
la limpieza, la publicidad probiótica y las tecnologías de los
antibióticos. Señala la consiguiente deformación de las complejidades de la vida microbiana a través de tales representaciones. Luego
se involucra con las experiencias de los usuarios de FMT para
desarrollar el concepto de Haraway de comunicación representada
a comunicación corpórea, que describe un modo de relacionarse
entre los usuarios de FMT y sus microbiomas. El documento luego
ofrece la comunicación corpórea como una herramienta conceptual
alternativa que pueden utilizar aquellos que no se han sometido
a FMT para comprender y apreciar mejor el yo microbiano.
‘. . .Our most sophisticated leap would be to drop the Manichaean view of microbes: “We
good; they evil.” [and to] supersede the 20th-century metaphor of war for describing the
relationship between people and infectious agents.’ (Lederberg, 2000, p. 296)
Exposing the nonhuman within, the human microbiome is increasingly being
revealed as essential for human functioning (Lorimer, 2016, 2017a, 2017b; VelasquezManoff, 2012b; Yong, 2017). Referred to as a ‘black box’ in the natural sciences the
microbiome, (dependant on the environment, diet and lifestyle) varies dramatically both
between and within groups of people (Cho & Blaser, 2012). There is no one ‘typical’ or
‘usual’ microbiome. Hence, this paper refers to an abstract and broad understanding of
the microbiome as the multitudes of microbial ecologies that make up the gut microbiome. As a starting point to look through the human-nonhuman interminglings and coflourishings, this paper uses Donna Haraway’s concept of companion species as a form
through which we may better learn ‘to pay attention’ to the microbial and revise the
prolonged but long ignored symbiotic relationship between the human and microbe. In
SOCIAL & CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY
3
doing so, it aims to revise and reposition respect for this relationship (Haraway, 2006,
p. 102). Using the concept of companion species in relation to the microbiome is fitting
in a time where there remains a common association in representations of microbial life
with the negative connotation of ‘germs’ as the Lederberg quote exemplifies. This is in
spite of the growing awareness of the importance of microbial life in the natural
sciences and the introduction of probiotics as ‘good bacteria’ in the public sphere.
Therefore, by using the concept of companion species, I explore the material technologies and practices of power that have both drawn together as well as distanced the
human from the microbe.
This paper then is concerned with the microbial-human interactions and ways of
being that are represented and enacted in Western popular imaginations and practices.
Drawing insight from interviews with prominent microbiologists, contemporary representations of microbial life in cleaning and probiotic product advertisements and the
medical procedure Faecal Microbiota Transplantation (FMT), the paper problematises
the good/bad microbe binary (seen in the adverts used) and contrasts it to the more
complex perspective that FMT users offer. FMT involves taking a sample of faecal matter
from a healthy donor and transplanting it into an ‘unhealthy’ gut to replenish the
microbial ecology and is used for many gut conditions where the microbiome ecology
is in dysbiosis (Seekatz et al., 2014, Terveer et al., 2016, Crum-Cianflone et al., 2015).
I first set out Haraway’s working of companion species and how the microbe has
become known in western history to then set out how the empirical work was undertaken. The paper then works through the disentanglements from microbial life through
current forms of microbial representation in cleaning, as well as probiotic advertising
and the technology of antibiotics. However, I must make clear, antibiotics have been
crucial in combating many life-threatening diseases, and are still very important. My
critique of antibiotics stems from the common misuse and over-dependence and
reliance that is leading to the ever-looming threat of antibiotic resistance and the role
it plays in the development of autoimmune conditions. I develop Haraway’s (2006)
concept of embodied communication to corporeal communication, distinguishing it
through the emphasis on both an increased awareness of microbial life but also the
corporeal, bodily, felt sensations as a form in which FMT users observe themselves
communicating with their new microbiomes. Throughout I argue that the binary understanding of microbial life propelled in probiotic and cleaning adverts as well as in certain
uses of antibiotics is problematic and acts to regress human microbial relations and (in
some cases) human health. Instead, an understanding grounded in Haraway’s concept of
companion species and inspired by FMT user’s understanding and interactions with their
microbiome offers a form of relationality and potential for respectful companionship
with the nonhuman within as well as outside the human.
The microbial human
Exploring the co-flourishings between the human and ‘big like us’ dog (Hird, 2009), Donna
Haraway uses the concept of companion species to highlight the interspecies, biological,
social and behavioural intermingling’s between humans and nonhumans (2003, 2008).
Recognising ‘a bestiary of agencies’ she focuses on the role of seeing and observation,
arguing that by revising how we see we may also learn ‘to pay attention’ (Haraway, 2003,
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p. 6). She offers the concept of recognising nonhumans’ ‘significant otherness’ to do this,
in attempts of working towards ‘vulnerable on-the groundwork that cobbles together
non-harmonious agencies and ways of living’ (Haraway, 2003, p. 6). Using her dog
‘Cayenne’ to explore these human-animal meetings and naturecultures, Haraway provides
an ethic for co-flourishing that emphasises responsibility and respect, refusing to reduce
nonhumans to ‘machines whose reactions are of interest but who have no presence, no
face that demands recognition, caring and shared pain’ (2008, p. 7).
The microbe complicates the concept of companion species as they exceed human
taxonomic, species and binomial means of trying to define organisms (Haraway, 2008,
p.100). However, before observing contemporary constructions of the microbe, we must
first delve into how the microbe came into existence in the western imagination and
unpick the development of the western hegemonic approach to the microbe. As Latour
highlights, formal practices of sanitation, sterilisation and hygiene took shape alongside
the development of vaccinations and antibiotics (1993). These enabled the move away
from miasma theory towards germ theory (1993). This ontological identity projected
onto the microbe informed western development, as hygiene and sanitation practices
‘made our lives better’ and ‘helped to change the world’ (Weinstock in VelasquezManoff, 2012a, p. 65). However, while enabling humans to survive many diseases,
germ theory also produced the microbe as a killable and controllable subject. Latour’s
Pasteurization of France is limited in its assumption that there was an end to the
discovery of microbial life, that microbe human relations went ‘from war machines to
war and peace’ (Latour, 1993, p. 3). Microbe-human peace is now being revealed as an
illusion that misjudged microbial agency. The fruits of such are becoming visible in
increasing autoimmune conditions (which although are hugely complex, broadly can be
understood as the immune system being continuously in inflammation mode; causing it
to attack the body’s cells) and increasing threats of antibiotic resistance.
Increasing autoimmune conditions, first explained by the hygiene hypothesis, is
now being challenged with the ‘old friends’ theory. The hygiene hypothesis, first
outlined by the epidemiologist Strachan, ‘proposed that a lower incidence of infection
in early childhood could be an explanation for the 20th century rise in atopic
diseases’ (Bloomfield et al., 2016, p. 214). However, this has been problematised as
increasing research suggests that it is not the infection rate that determines autoimmunity but instead, is dependent on the exposure to and familiarisation with
microbial life that humans evolved with. Contact with specific microbes (coined ‘old
friends’) enables the programming of the human immune system. Without this
contact, the immune system may not develop correctly, leading to autoimmune
conditions (Rook & Brunet, 2005). Since this discovery, there has been a movement
to remove the association of hygiene to autoimmune conditions completely as it is
argued the role that hygiene plays in maintaining health standards and reducing the
risks of infection is critical (Bloomfield et al., 2016). Although this evidence is compelling, the hygiene hypothesis has not been rejected by all. As research is revealing,
particular soaps and detergents have a negative effect on the immunoregulation
functioning of the human body (Rook, 2010).
As perceptions have developed to understand that not all of microbial life is lifeending, a binary understanding has concurrently developed that distinguishes microbial
life as either an ‘old friend’ or an enemy. This is exemplified in Paxson’s (2008) work as
SOCIAL & CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY
5
she points to the cohabitation between humans and microbes in artisan cheese. She
does so through the dichotomous labelling of microbial life as either good or bad.
Paxson recalls of cleaning as an essential process when making cheese. As she explains
‘cleaning is productive of high-quality cheese because it enables the good microbes to
win out over the pathogenic’ (Paxson, 2008, p. 33). Here Paxson reproduces the lines of
a moral economy through a perceived battle between the good and the bad, a concept
that appears as problematic for understanding and perceiving the complexity of the
microbe and the ecologies it is entangled in. Alongside this, concluding that microbes
have transitioned ‘from an idiom of peril to one of promise’, Paxson and Helmreich
suggest that because of the Pasturian techniques that have enabled the removal of
‘deadly disease-causing microbes’, microbial life is largely seen as full of promise (2014,
p. 165). However, this conclusion seems to resonate within an academic context, and the
dichotomous temporal placing of microbial life as previously of ‘peril’ to currently of
‘promise’ seems too simplistic. As Greenhough makes clear with the common cold virus,
perceptions remain predominantly as perilous as viruses are observed: ‘as an external
threat to be eradicated’ (2012, p. 295).
The microbe’s role in human functioning then complicates classic understandings of the
human. However, while humans depend on the microbiome, although having a host to live
in, the microbial ecologies that make up the microbiome can easily out live the human. Hird
reinstates this as she explains ‘microontologies further recognize that the vast majority of
microbial intra-actions have nothing to do with humans’ (2010, p. 37). The power balance
remains with the human depending on the fluctuating masses of microbial life that humans
live with. As Woese in Blakeslee (1996) make clear, ‘if you wiped out all multicellur life forms
off the face of the earth, microbial life might shift a tiny bit ..If microbial life were to
disappear, that would be instant death for the planet’ (in Hird 2010; p 37).
Taking note of the necessity, benefits and uses of microbial interaction, Paxson has
coined the term ‘post-Pasteurian’ to observe practices that encourage, instead of warn
against microbial life (2008). She offers a post-Pasteurian approach as a form of microbiopolitics, which she explains as ‘the creation of categories of microscopic biological
agents; the anthropocentric evaluation of such agents; and the elaboration of appropriate human behaviours vis-`a-vis microorganisms engaged in infection, inoculation,
and digestion’ (Paxson, 2008, p. 17). Alternative medical practices that adopt a postPasteurian ontology have arisen as a response to autoimmune diseases, which intend to
recreate a balanced and diverse microbiome through a process of reintroducing microbial life (Lorimer, 2017a, 2017b).
The alternative medicating practice Faecal Microbiota Transplantation (FMT), falls
under a post-Pasteurian form of medicating and acts as a material reintroduction of
microbial life into a depleted microbiome ecology. FMT can be used for two broad
groups of illness. The first is where one microbe overpopulates, as is the case for
a condition called Colostrum Difficile (C.Diff) which, although occurs in cases of contaminated food, occurs most commonly when antibiotics are taken (Blaser, 2016; Leffer
& Lamont, 2015). Colonisation resistance theory is the predominant theory used to
explain FMT used for these conditions and states that the microbiome can prohibit
invading bacteria through a diverse and healthy colonisation of gut microbiota (Pamer,
2016). When the microbiome ecology is wakened, such as when antibiotics (which
indiscriminately kill microbes) are taken, C.Diff (in cases) can then proliferate to the
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detriment of the host (Pamer, 2016). The other, more broad type of condition that FMT is
used for, is microbiome dysbiosis (where the ecology is out of balance) and is associated
with a wide range of autoimmune conditions such as Irritable Bowel Disease. However,
this treatment context is much less well defined. Due to the complexity and ecological
diversity of the microbiome and the variability of host conditions between individuals, it
is hard to define the conditions of a microbiome in dysbiosis that might be causing an
issue than if one microbe simply overpopulates (Kostic, Xavier, & Gevers, 2014).
Unpicking microbial representation and interaction
Microbes must be represented, Paxson and Helmreich make this clear: ‘it is important to
bear in mind that [a] microbial being does not speak for itself’. Considering this, if as
Hinchliffe (2008) suggests, in representing ‘a copy is a betrayal’ and that ‘representation
becomes a matter of more than one identity, a more complex field of becoming’ (p.
93–94), representations act to silence and speak for microbial life. Hence, microbial
representation is more than factual recording. Through the discursively embedded
identity-making practices of representation, ‘ways of seeing’, engagement and understandings are affected. Microbial life is presented within such representations in order to
justify its destruction or justify its nurturing. FMT, on the other hand, acts as a form of
microbiome manipulation and is a physical engagement with microbial life that can be
observed and felt by the user.
In what follows I reflect on a year-long research project that stretched from
September 2016–2017. The findings discussed were sourced from three contemporary
western areas of microbial interaction and representation. These include in-depth and
semi-structured sixty-minute, one-to-one skype interviews with two prominent microbiologists, Dr Nicola Fawcett and Dr Jack Gilbert, and five FMT users. The paper is
cautious to observe the scientific voices as ‘corrective’ or as ‘true objective representations’, what Haraway (1989) would refer to as succumbing to ‘the siren call of the
scientists’ (p. 7). They have been included in the paper as they offer a narrative that
differs from the dominant narratives within medical spaces regarding microbial life and
conceptualisations of the human body, and was echoed by some FMT users. Alongside
this, the role of doctors (as researchers but also clinicians) that produce and also
disseminate medical knowledge have an important role in the production of understanding of microbial life and for offering alternative narratives. Because many FMT users
are in precarious work due to the conditions that lead them to use FMT, skype interviews were not possible for all the research participants, instead extensive e-mail
interviewing was performed with an additional seven FMT users. Each skype interview
was recorded and then transcribed verbatim. The introductory questions given to the
microbiologists asked them to first introduce their field of research and introduce FMT
from a natural science perspective, a background to their research and how they convey
their findings to the public. The FMT questions, similarly, involved questions that asked
them to introduce FMT as a medical practice, their opinions and experiences with FMT
and how they think about their body. To maintain the research participant’s anonymity
pseudonyms were allocated to all FMT users.
Alongside interviewing, I discursively analysed twenty probiotic adverts and twenty
cleaning adverts. However, the analysis only references six probiotic, and six domestic
SOCIAL & CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY
7
cleaning advertisements as these demonstrated the dominant representations of the
wider narratives. The adverts analysed were chosen as they represent marketing from
contemporary leading International Corporation’s that are household names in the west
and advertise everyday cleaning products. They were selected based on their accessibility via YouTube and whether they had been aired in western mass media within the
last ten years. Using Semiotic discursive and inductive analysis, key narratives and
discourses were unpicked via manual thematic coding. Some codes were sourced
from literature while other codes emerged through the process of transcribing the
interviews and analysing adverts. Specifically, corporeal communication was
a reoccurring theme, having in mind Haraway’s concept of embodied communication
as a code. It developed as research respondents used language that specifically referred
to their corporeal body and felt sensations that they became aware of during and after
the procedure.
Although microbial engagement and representation occurs in many swathes, from
common cold viruses (Greenhough, 2012), to artisan cheese (Paxson, 2012), to probiotics
as a form of re-wilding (Lorimer, 2017b), to viral encounters in agriculture (Hinchliffe,
Bingham, Alen, & Carter, 2016), the following threads of analysis all relate to the
microbial interactions that occur within the human situated in the western world. This
is because higher rates of autoimmune disease occur in the west and global north
compared to the east and south (Bach, 2005; Lerner, Jeremias, & Matthias, 2015;
Velasquez-Manoff, 2012a). The paper then aims to add to a conversation regarding
microbial representation and engagement, observing how and if microbial life’s significant otherness is animated to engage in some form of companionship. In the following
sections, I look at how these different discursive cloths are sewn to provide contrasting
views of microbial life and how FMT users revise these to form new modes of relating
with their microbiomes.
Bad germs
The adverts act to create material and conceptual space between humans and microbes.
In doing so, they position the microbe through the negatively connotated term ‘germ’.
As both Hinchliffe and Latour highlighted through germ theory, although also understood in the natural sciences as a name that refers to scale, the term germ has undergone negative association (Hinchliffe et al., 2016; Latour, 1993). As Hinchliffe et al. (2016)
suggests, ‘germ theory rekindles a sovereign and legalistic notion of disease. . . [where]
some infectious diseases and their microbial agents became notifiable and matters of
legal jurisdiction once their presence had been confirmed. They were matters to become
extinct’ (p. 32). The cleaning adverts function in ways that indeed position microbial
‘germs’ as matters to become extinct. This occurs most evidently by representing the
microbe with monstrous aesthetics123 and an anthropomorphised evil character1. These
characters combined encourage a response of fear and repulsion. As is made clear in the
Domestos advert ‘Vom master’ where a microbe jollily and in the tune of ‘London bridge
is falling down’ sings ‘I’m gonna make some people vom people vom people vom, Spew
their guts and cry to mom A’int that pretty’1.
However, the cleaning adverts also position the microbe as a ‘germ’ to be eradicated
by animating immunity and biosecurity discourse. The branch of immunology from the
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biomedical sciences stipulates the immune system as both ‘a learning device’ and
a protection system and has been mobilised within the social sciences and philosophy
(Bloomfield et al., 2016). Martin (1994, 2000) highlights the common use of martial
language used when referring to the immune system, where ‘germs’ are the enemy or
perceived threat to the immune system and must be destroyed. Narratives of martial
immunisation, where microbial interactions were positioned as threatening and in need
of waging war on, were common in the martial language and imagery that was used
within the cleaning adverts. In the advert Duck Domestos3 the ‘germs’ are shown to
organise themselves in a warlike military fashion and use the ‘immune self’ model
originally proposed by Burnet, a prominent virologist and immunologist, who proposed
the immune system as a ‘defensive network against the hostile exterior world’ (Gilbert,
Sapp, & Tauber, 2012, p. 330). In using this mythic concept of immunity that is premised
in ‘the science of self/non-self-discrimination’ (Klein, 1982), bleach enables the distinction of self from non-self, self from absolute danger.
Similarly, to immunology, biosecurity attempts to create and maintain ‘disease free’
and ‘healthy’ bodies, and spaces reproducing the concept of ‘healthy/unhealthy’ boundaries. The ideology of martial immunity and practice of biosecurity are combined in the
adverts through the capitalist venture of the cleaning industry. An ‘individualised human
self’ is maintained through a biosecure ideology. The adverts reinforce this by heightening the viewer’s awareness of microbial life’s ubiquity. Yet they reproduce a narrative
that suggests microbial contact is dangerous. Examples of this can be seen in the advert
‘Touch me’,
‘Germs’ at a disco singing Samantha fox ‘Touch me (I want your body) song as they
jump from inside the toilet onto a human hand. Narrator: ‘hate touching germs?..
[product] leaves toilet hygienically fresh. . .never touch germs again!’4
By focusing on the threat that contact poses to the human, the adverts work to entice
the viewer to believe that removed contact with microbial life is both possible and
should be desired for the health of the individual and family. Through the continual
removal of other life, the cleaning products provide security for the family and secure
the notion of a bounded human figure (Hird, 2009).
Biosecuring the individual human self against the ‘bad germs’, can be seen through
the excessive consumption of antibiotics that for some FMT users caused irreversible
damage. The FMT users that had used FMT because of gut conditions mentioned
overuse of antibiotics or as Benny recalled, ‘antibiotic abuse’. Especially David, who
explained,
‘I was looking for a solution to recolonise the gut microbiome. I assumed that I had
depleted my microbial diversity because I had chronic dysbiosis. . . due to many courses
of antibiotics. . .’ (personal interview).
And Mike
“so they [the antibiotics] were actually what destroyed my health, I had like a painful
infection in my urine tract. . .so I went to the doctor, and they gave me some weak
antibiotic, and it didn’t work, and so they were like ‘we will give you this one’, . . ..I took it,
and my life was destroyed honestly. . . I could no longer digest dairy at all; I became
bloated . . .I started passing blood immediately; I couldn’t eat I was constantly sleepy. . .
[and] I was depressed.” (personal interview, emphasis added).
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9
In both of these cases, it can be seen that strong antibiotics caused life-altering damage
to both these FMT users.
Perhaps then, if microbiopolitics refers to the biopolitical configuration of the microbial (Paxson, 2008), microbiosecurity describes the attempts of recreating a biosecure
human subject. In attempting to secure a human figure that is free from ‘germs’ or
microbial life, the maintenance of the molecular intrinsically involves, perhaps most
prominently attempting to end microbial life. Consequences of attempting to maintain
a microbiosecure body prompt both the desire for microbial extermination as well as
avoidance altogether, which, similarly to macro-biosecurity practices, increases susceptibility and vulnerability (Hinchliffe et al., 2016). Hence, an ideology of immunity and
application of biosecurity to the body (which positions the ‘microbe as villain’ and as
something that necessitates waging war on) fosters a more violent companionship
between human and microbe that is not willing to recognise the significant otherness
of microbial life. This ironically seems to elicit the most damaging violence to the
persons waging it through the resulting auto-immune conditions that occur due to
a lack of contact with microbial ‘old friends’.
Good bacteria
Disrupting the notion of microbial life as threatening, probiotic forms of treatment have
been positioned as an alternative form of food supplement as well as medicating
medium to antibiotics. Probiotic methods ‘seek to re-engineer internal ecologies’
through systems of attempted control of microbial life with the intent ‘to secure desired
systematic properties’ (Lorimer, 2016, p. 58). Probiotic supplements (for humans)
expanded in the western markets after food scares (such as listeria and E.coli) alongside
growing fears of genetically modified food that ruptured in the late 1980s and 1990s
(Nerlich & Koteyko, 2008, p. 2). Probiotics went alongside organic food as part of
a ‘natural push back’ to genetically engineered and potentially dangerous foods that
were feared to be harbouring ‘bad bacteria’ (Nerlich & Koteyko, 2008). Since these food
scares, probiotic drinks have continued to ‘become one of the fastest growing sectors in
the dairy market’ and are still ‘heavily promoted for human consumption’ (Nerlich &
Koteyko, 2008, p. 5).
The construction of the ‘good microbe’ most prominently occurs through the
repeated referral to either ‘friendly’, ‘good’ or ‘healthy bacteria’. The concept of ‘friendly
bacteria’ is reinforced by the aesthetic and flow of bodies within the adverts. Compared
to the monstrous appearance and evil character of the ‘bad germs’ that are presented in
the cleaning adverts, the probiotic ‘good bacteria’ are quite the opposite. Such as in the
‘Inner health plus advert’, the probiotic figures are goofy, bumbling, and without the
ability of language, are dim characters5. Probiotics appear as slow and stupid figures and
are shown to interact with humans in an excessively loving manner. For example in the
probiotic drink ‘Yakult, love your insides’ advert; a cute, cuddly stuffed animal version of
a stomach (happy because of the effect that the probiotics have on it) and a human are
shown exchanging gifts on Christmas, playing in the park and holding hands6. With the
tagline ‘when you love your digestive system it will love you back’ the advert insinuates
that probiotics should be used to express ‘love’ to your digestive system6. The advert
recognises the bad cousin ‘germ’ but rebrands it with adjectives such as good, healthy
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and friendly; replacing the word ‘germ’ with the less negatively connoted term ‘bacteria’.
Another common theme is the frequently reproduced bouncy, smiling bodies, such as in
the ‘Faulding probiotics’7 advert which shows men and women dancing, jumping and
air guitaring to “Bohemian Like you” by’ the Dandy Warhols and the ‘Culturelle’ advert8
that uses the tagline ‘made to feel human again’. These narratives reproduce human
exceptionalism discourse as multispecies entanglement is projected as something only
to engage with when the human benefits through the excessive amounts of energy.
Alongside this, a hierarchy between human and nonhuman can be seen when, for the
bacteria to be worthy of not killing they must be overtly lesser than human intelligence,
appear as obviously non-threatening and communicate through anthropomorphised
mediums.
Although the use of probiotics recognises the beneficial aspects that arise from
microbial interactions and working with microbial life, their ‘good bacteria’ label, much
like the ‘bad germ’ label, is misleading. Promising probiotic protection, probiotics work
within an immunity discourse, acting as an alternative form of ‘increasing’ the body’s
protection. However, it seems that although beneficial in certain circumstances the
rationale behind probiotics is not so clear-cut. Dr Nicola Fawcett highlights the lack of
knowledge regarding the effects of probiotics as she posited:
‘I guess when [we] think about probiotics, you say is it good to take a section of the
Amazon rainforest and dump it in a completely different country? Maybe, maybe not,
are palm trees good? It depends where they are..’ (personal interview).
Therefore, although research shows that microbial diversity is beneficial, as
Dr Fawcett indicates, microbiomes contain a highly individual and unique collection of
microbiota. Hence, to quote the ‘Restore probiotic chocoballs’ advert introducing up to,
but not limited to, ‘three billion probiotic warriors’9 into the host’s microbiome might
not be as beneficial as the adverts suggest. Dr Jack Gilbert warns against the simplistic
understanding of probiotics as ‘good’,
‘The problem with the microbiome is it has given people the opposite, right? That
more microbial exposure, is good right? “Well I should pump myself with probiotics”,
without really understanding whether they do anything . . .and we have to be very very
careful about that because to a certain extent [probiotics] are an unregulated industry’
(personal interview).
The production of probiotics as goofy, bumbling characters, therefore, reproduces
a simplified identity of ‘good bacteria’ and an assumption that they are harmless. It
seems that by indiscriminately adding more microbial life within the body, the unique
assortment and complex ecologies of the microbiome are not respected. The dangers of
such were exemplified by David, as he explains that, ‘I became extremely sick after
taking probiotics. That was when I realised just how much of my problems were
microbiome related’ (personal interview).
If, as Haraway (2013) suggests, the Giver Of Diversity (G.O.D) was originally the
concept of immunity as conceptualised through Gershon’s imagining of ‘the immunological orchestra’ (Golub, 1987, p. 533), ‘Probiotic Forte’, a Serbian pharmaceutical
company suggest probiotics as the new G.O.D. In marketing materials, the company
present the probiotic, with the assistance of a magic wand, as able to orchestrate the
previously grey microbiome into a beautifully sounding and brightly coloured set of
microbial life10. However, considering the risks of probiotics that David highlighted and
SOCIAL & CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY
11
the lack of knowledge into the effects that probiotics might have that Dr Jack Gilbert
and Dr Nicola Fawcett refer to, it seems unlikely that a pharmaceutical corporation is G.
O.D. Instead G.O.D as immunity can be replaced by the microbiome. Less fictional than
the immunity discourse (Chen, 2011) and less capital orientated than probiotic marketing, the microbiome is a multispecies entanglement and, when treated correctly, can
maintain balance within the body. Indeed, as Mike (an FMT interview participant)
expressed, ‘I want just by nature to be healthy, and my microbiome is the orchestrator
of that in so many ways’ (personal interview).
To conclude this section, it seems that neither bad ‘germs’ nor good bacteria are
good models to think with for better companionship with the microbe. The term ‘germ’
promotes extinction of microbial life hence creating material and conceptual distance,
while by adding the limited label of ‘good’ to bacteria. The necessity in diversity and
complex and unique selection of microbial life that make up the microbiome is similarly
not respected. How then might we revise microbial life from its dichotomous status to
observe its significant otherness and re-entangle with the microbial?
Re-entangling with our microbial self: corporeal communication
Through the process of introducing a ‘foreign’ microbiome, FMT acts as a postPasteurian medium of medication, by ‘want[ing] to invest in the potentialities of collaborative human and microbial cultural practices’ (Paxson, 2012, p. 118). FMT users then
exemplify an extreme case of microbial estrangement and use FMT to materially and
microbially re-associate themselves. In doing so, I suggest they animate a mode of
relating to their microbiomes by becoming more physically aware of and considerate
of their microbiome.
Having previously experienced an extremely disrupted gut microbiome ecology, FMT
users become hyper-aware of the microbial interactions that occur within them. as FMT
user Mike exemplified,
“Because if they [Mike’s microbiome] aren’t hungry I’m not going to feed them and so
I think before I got sick I would just eat all the time. . .and now this microbiome, now that it
seems to be in a good place I can eat. . . but for the most part, if I actually check in, I don’t
want that sugar, I have a good healthy balanced microbiome, and they’re not hungry for
sugar that’s for sure!” (personal interview).
The conversation between Mike and his microbiome in some ways expresses embodied
communication, which Smuts (2006), in observing the greetings between human and
nonhuman, suggests becomes part of the process of ‘becoming’. In this, then the
greeting rituals act as forms of embodied communication that exist between and within
species (both human and nonhuman). Perhaps more prominently, however, is Haraway’s
use of embodied communication. Continuing from Smuts, she suggests that,
“An embodied communication is more like a dance than a word. The flow of entangled
meaningful bodies in time – whether jerky and nervous or flaming and flowing, whether
both partners move in harmony or painfully out of sync or something else all-together”
(Haraway, 2008, p. 26).
Haraway (2008) suggests that modes of relating occur between herself and Cayenne her
dog, through evolution, love, companionship and practices of agility. As the above
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A. BECK
quotation very well describes, embodied communication occurs between Haraway and
Cayenne, in the continued gestures and movement between bodies that occur in dog
agility. Through such, Haraway makes clear they both learn to relate to each other. Using
Smuts, who suggests that spoken language offers easier means through which to lie,
Haraway (2008) posits that body language is more revealing and readable than spoken
language. As she emphasises ‘the truth or honesty of nonlinguistic embodied communication depends on looking back and greeting significant others, again and again’
(emphasis added p. 27). But what happens when there are no bodies to observe the
gestures of? Greenhough (2012) in recognising that viruses are not defined as species,
looks at embodied communication between the common cold virus in the human in the
Common Cold Unit (CCU) between 1946–90. She argues that the physical effects of the
immune system’s response to the virus (the sore throat for example) were important for
the CCU scientists to learn to ‘communicate’ with the virus in the clinical trial setting of
the CCU. As she highlights the CCU found that, ‘it seems the more humans and viruses
are exposed to each other, the less virulent those relations become’, hence in revising
the usual negative view of the embodied experience of a cold, we might come to better
understand our viral companions (2012).
The communication within FMT users although similar has some distinct nuances and
differences from that of an embodied communication that Haraway (2003), Smuts (2006)
and Greenhough (2012) refer to. If an embodied communication occurs through or in
the tangible or visible gestures between bodies or as Greenhough’s (2012) example
shows, in the singular setting of a viral cold. Corporeal communication refers to the
continual, everyday awareness of the corporeal bodily functions as a way of communicating with the microbiome. Instead of observing the gestures between two bodies,
FMT users posited how they became observant to how the microbiome expressed itself
through bodily functions and what these expressions felt like as a form of communication; a heightened bodily sense. FMT users refered to a corporeal dialogue, where the
bodily sensations are observed with an increased awareness. Most obviously this was
seen where digestive sensations of gut pain, nausea, diarrhoea or bloating were exstensivley reflected on. Perhaps indicating an issue with a specific change in their diets or
particular stress inducing practice that could be having a negative affect on the microbiome, where possible these were altered in order to prevent such feelings continuing.
Ensuring to respect and take consideration of their new microbiomes is crucial for the
health restoring effects of the procedure to continue. Hence, post FMT, an awareness of
this felt sensation and bodily awareness appeared as an important mode of communication. This, similarly to embodied communication, as Haraway states, is about ‘coconstituting naturalcultural dancing, holding in esteem, and [being aware of] those who
look back reciprocally. Always tripping, this kind of truth has a multispecies future’
(Haraway, 2008, p27). It is the continual felt corporeal as a way of communicating
with the microbiome to understand what the microbiome can and cannot process
and manage – a felt way of shared understanding. The emphasis is on the listening
that takes seriously these bodily feelings as signs and responding with respect for and of
the new microbiome. As Mike explained, when detailing his relationship with his microbiome after FMT, ‘I mean I have to listen to its [Mikes microbiome’s] nature and that like
even though I’ve been healed to a certain extent, I don’t want to abuse myself’ (personal
interview). This corporeal communication however also developed for some into
SOCIAL & CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY
13
a broader bodily awareness as interview participant Sally made clear. She exemplified
this process as she detailed of her life before and after FMT,
“So now when I feed my body, I feed it more well rounded nutrients, so I think that just it
gave me a broader look on life and how to treat my body for longevity. . .I didn’t listen to my
body; I just pushed it too hard. . . I was probably averaging about 3–4 hours of sleep at night..
So I wasn’t listening. I was just burning myself out. Now I listen to my body I don’t know
a good way to verbalise this, but it’s just a way less intense environment that I am putting my
body in. . . so when it’s tired I don’t work out, when I feel like I have the energy I might do
a little bit more working out. I think the whole moral of this is that I listen to my body a lot
more now than I did previously” (personal interview).
Here Sally emphasises how she listens to her body through physical sensations, by
changing her diet and attempting to have a wider variety of nutrients. However, she also
mentions taking greater note of paying attention to the feelings of tiredness or lethargy.
As she mentions, she views her body in a more holistic way, which takes greater note of
the different corporeal sensations, what these might indicate and what she might need
to do in response to these.
In this corporeal communication, FMT, although physically placed in a new host, the
microbial life can express agency. As Haraway (2003) emphasises, ‘(i)nter-subjectivity
does not mean “equality,” a literally deadly game in dogland; but it does mean paying
attention to the conjoined dance of face-to-face significant otherness’ (p. 41). Although
not equal, in the dance of corporeal communication between the microbiome and host,
there exists another dance, one of agency as the newly introduced microbiome and host
microbiome meet and mingle in the lining of the gut. In this meeting, assimilation and
colonisation are possible. However, there is also the possibility of rejection. As Mike
expressed, unlike the Goldilocks story, Mike’s second attempt at receiving FMT from
a different donor to the first was just right, as he explained,
“I had three different donors; I got to try different people, the first one was not helpful, the
third one wasn’t helpful, it was right in the centre this one particular donor it all lined up for
whatever reason and anytime that I would inject it into me. . .I would just feel [my] digestion
[get] turned on” (personal interview).
Here, Mike conveys corporeal communication as he reflects on differences in FMT
experience, corporeally noticing the difference between the new microbial life that
the FMT donors provide and coming to understand the agency of his gut to reject or
accept and hence assimilate different FMT donors’ microbiomes with his microbiome. A process through which he comes to pay better attention to this dance
of agency.
In corporal communication, it is important to consider what it is that is being
communicated. As Dr Nicola Fawcett prompts us to consider,
“The question is; what are we telling our microbes? If we are communicating on some level with
bacteria, what message are we giving them by our everyday actions?” (personal interview).
If, in using antibiotics and antibacterials the message from humans to bacteria is one
of violence and hostility that does not instil an understanding of significant otherness
nor consequent companionship, the message between FMT users and their microbiomes seems to be a more attentive communication, recognising both death and life
14
A. BECK
inside the community and the fragility of the human body. Here then this transition
in how FMT users feel they interact with their microbiomes is important for the
transition in the discourse surrounding microbial life. As Martin’s work highlights
previous immunity rhetoric is laden with metaphors of defence, emphasising aggression against the perceived ‘enemy’ (2000). Here FMT users are changing the rhetoric
to one of conversation, where cultivating a relationship that works for both members
is aimed for, to reverse a previously dysfunctional relationship to a more functional
co-existence. By having gut conditions that are associated with the disruption of the
microbiome, FMT users appear to be more attuned to their microbiome ecology and
practices that might cause irritation or death within the microbiome, as Joe (an
interview participant) explained,
“I do eat a shit ton of fibre though (to feed my little microbial friends!). . .I have Crohn’s
Disease, which means I have to manage it naturally through diet, sleep, exercise, sun
exposure and stress relief.. I wish I could take medicine to counter the effects of eating
shit food occasionally, but I’m not keen to mess up my microbiome. I have a very diverse
gut microbiome these days” (personal interview).
How Joe talks of his microbiome appears similar to that of a companion species
relationship that Haraway (2006) refers to when she suggests ‘companion species
must instead learn to live intersectionally’ (p. 101). In making sure to feed his microbiome enough fibre and by not introducing foods that they will not be able to manage,
Joe shows a respectful and responsible companionship with his nonhuman self. He
expresses an awareness of how his actions are being received by the microbiome. Hence
in responding to the corporeal functions that might represent something that has
negatively affected the microbiome, Joe has responded along the lines of respect and
care for his microbiome. The corporal communication that occurs depends on the host’s
respect and responsibility in thinking and acting with the microbiome in mind in order
to attempt a status of health.
Therefore, the FMT user’s interviewed in cases exemplified well, recognising and
respecting the importance of significant otherness of their microbiomes. Although the
‘painfully out of sync moments’ that Haraway refers to in embodied communication do
occur in FMT users, they are indeed painful for the human host. Representing a mode of
relating that might reflect practices that are bad for the microbiome (such as consumption of refined sugar) there is an emphasis on understanding the moments of being ‘in
sync’ in order to progress towards a more stable state of health. Therefore, FMT users
referred to attempting to acquire a greater awareness of and maintain a respectful
approach to their microbiome. The FMT users interviewed however did animate
Haraway (2006) when, in referring to companion species as ways of revising respect,
she suggests,
“to hold in regard, to respond, to look back reciprocally, to notice, to pay attention, to have
courteous regard for, to esteem: all of that is tied to the polite greeting, to constituting the
polis: where and when species meet. To knot companionship and species together in the
encounter, in regard and respect, is to enter the world of becoming with, where, who, and
what are, are precisely are at stake.” (p. 102).
FMT users, understood what was at risk of ‘becoming with’ their microbiomes, as a lack
of respect and regard for their microbiomes materialised in a colitis flare-up, where the
SOCIAL & CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY
15
host/human suffers from desperate pain and discomfort. As Benny explained in relation
to some of the FMT users he had encountered on the FMT online groups,
“They go through and pay the thousands of dollars to do this [FMT] and then you find out
they flare-up again, and they have gone back to eating crap food and you’re like, of course
you’re going to go backwards, you take your foot off the break and you go backwards. . .for
me I am so conscious of not letting that happen, like even, I noticed that lately, I have been
eating a few things, when I didn’t have any options, I was eating sushi and rice and stuff. . .
because I cut all of that out, because it turns to sugar quickly, [if I eat it again] then some
symptoms come back, so it’s like ongoing health, if you have that good bacteria in your
gut. . .you have to keep on feeding it healthy stuff” (personal interview).
Here Benny details that because he had altered his diet after FMT in order to not
experience the bodily sensations of constipation and diarrhoea, he is hyper-aware
now when he does ‘slip’ and have something that might disrupt his microbiome.
Hence by not having courteous regard for the microbiome in consuming foods that
are not beneficial for the microbiome, he was forced to pay attention through the
physical discomfort and pain. FMT user Mike also referred to the mind-gut connection,
observing that if his microbiome was to accept the new microbiome, he needed to
respect the necessity in remaining calm as stress chemically alters the microbiome (Rea,
Dinan, & Cryan, 2016). As he explained, ‘but if I’m stressed my Microbiome will be
affected, our relationship will, we won’t be happy’. Both Benny and Mike exemplified
paying attention corporeally and changed behaviours to have ‘courteous regard’ for
their biome. Although not consistently, as Benny made clear, they highlighted that
making kin with their microbiome was a process based on continual awareness of
their gut and body.
If the introduction of microbial life is successful in maintaining health (through
preventing disease) and can be conceptualised as working with the body, when thinking
about antibiotics and antibacterials as mediums of medication that have the potential to
agitate the microbial balance of the microbiome (making the body more vulnerable to
disease), in certain circumstances they act to work against the body. This occurs by
reproducing the microbe as an insignificant other and creating conceptual and material
distance between the human and microbe. The consequences of such can be seen
through the decreased diversity of microbial life in humans. On a broad scale, these take
shape in increasing rates of autoimmune conditions (especially within the west but also
globally), the mistreatment of antibiotics and consequent production of antibiotic
resistance or, in the case of C.Diff, where one bacteria may overpopulate. Although
a lot about microbial diversity and ecology remains unknown, there appears fertile
grounds within the global north for a better societal awareness of the significant
otherness of the microbial. In taking inspiration from FMT users as they disrupt the
notion of a biosecure ‘self’ and recognising the significant otherness of their microbial
selves, those who have not undergone the procedure of FMT may benefit from corporeal communication as a conceptual tool. Prompting us to pay better attention to our
microbiome and the felt bodily functions and sensations it causes and what these might
mean; corporeal communication might be used to reveal the importance of listening to
the body, to develop a better corporeal awareness and more broadly, to recognise the
importance of the nonhuman within.
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A. BECK
Conclusion
This paper has argued that there remains a need to revise the microbial from ‘over
friendly’ and ‘dim-witted’ probiotic and ‘evil germ’ antibiotic representation to (in most
cases) a necessary companion. As highlighted within this research, cleaning adverts act
to cement a representation of microbial life that is positioned within a, ‘We good; they
evil’ dichotomy (Lederberg, 2000, p. 296). Antibiotics and antibacterials both animate
this dichotomy and have contributed to the material implications that can be seen in the
conceptual and physical distance from the microbe. Representing the microbe through
the negatively associated term ‘germ’ has positioned the microbe as an insignificant
other; manifestations of such have occurred in the predominance of autoimmune
conditions in the west. Although probiotics develop this dichotomy so that some
microbes are seen as ‘good’, the dichotomy remains hierarchal and reduces the necessity in microbial diversity and dependence on multiplicity. Hence, the good, bad binary
that assumes the human’s ability to have control over human microbe interactions does
not act as a tool that enables humans to better pay attention to the microbe as
a significant other in the forming of the bios; they act to work against observing the
microbe as a companion species.
With Haraway suggesting that ‘it matters which thoughts think thoughts’ the relationship between FMT user and microbiome in corporal communication sets a relational,
respectful and responsible precedent for future relations. In thinking about the conversation that our actions incite within our body and microbiome, it is important to
consider how this encourages the removal or introduction of life into the body. If by
using bleach and antibiotics the message is ‘you need to be nasty’, and by using
probiotics the balance within the microbiome is not respected, although cautious of
anthropomorphising microbial life, there appears a need to think about how interactions
are interpreted and instead how we might be better companions to the microbial world
that is essential to and within all forms of life. Hence, the everyday use of antibacterial
and bleach products and consumption practices might be reflected upon and revised.
As FMT users exemplified, they were cautious of consuming antibiotics and some
probiotics, but also referred to becoming more aware of both foods and everyday
practices that were and were not good for their microbiomes.
In considering corporal companionship as a conceptual tool for those who have not
undergone FMT, Hird’s (2009) suggestion of a microbial ethic that is relational and can
extend outside of the microbial and into the nonhuman more broadly, seems appropriate. As Hird (2009) suggests ‘what it [a bacterial ethic] does is a startling extension to
those with whom we meet-with’ (p. 143) and to consider Smuts, who suggests that,
“To take back our personhood in relation to other animals changes everything. Anyone who
seriously engages in this task comes to realise that our planet is replete with opportunities
to form personal relationships with many different kinds of beings. Even if most of us end
up forming bonds only with domestic animals, it is important to fully digest the fact that
millions and millions of potential nonhuman friends exist in our forests and oceans,
savannas and swamps.” (Smuts, 2006, p. 125).
We may use corporeal communication to ‘take back our personhood in relation to the
nonhuman within us’ as well as elsewhere in other nonhuman forms of life, as Smuts
points out (Smuts, 2006 p. 125). In recognising the symbiotic relationship and hence
SOCIAL & CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY
17
‘significant otherness’ that exists within the body, both as a daily necessity and for the
evolution and development of the human, we might re-adjust an assumption of human
superiority over other nonhumans that we engage with. In doing so, we may observe
the everyday necessity of co-mingling and dependence on nonhumans and animate
a more respectful and responsible companionship with the nonhuman both ‘big like us’
as well as small and not like us.
Notes
1. Vom master-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hbcmWVOVS8.
2. Domestos Alcatraz-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xsdjqXRx1E8.
3. Duck Domestos -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gn68vtbz5Hs.
4. Touch me -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NCRiamBXj4.
5. Inner health plus-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPMmKEhgzgE.
6. Yakult, love your insides-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjffmG9Z7zE.
7. Faulding -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0S7SzkDUbI.
8. Culturelle -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BkN07K58u78.
9. Restore probiotic chocoballs – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQhlOyfjBgk.
10. Probiotic forte-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJTOI_8G1tw.
Acknowledgments
The author would like to thank the editors at Social & Cultural geography, and the two anonymous
reviewers for their constructive and thoughtful feedback on the paper. Special thanks go to
Kathryn Yusoff for such considerate guidance, and to Maria Fannin and Franklin Ginn for their
additional support.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
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