Browsing by Subject "Mushrooms"

This thesis examines the sociality between mushroom pickers and mushrooms in the Greater Helsinki region of Southern Finland. The focus of the thesis is on interspecies social relations and interaction, and there is an emphasis on the role of place in the material mediation of these relationships. Examining these relationships, a discussion then follows about whether these observations are enough to suggest a “mushroom personhood” in the cultural thought of mushroom enthusiasts. The thesis endeavors to further the understanding of the social interconnections of different lifeforms by examining how mushroomers and mushrooms engage with each other as well as their surroundings in the forest. The thesis is positioned within current debates over the possible causes and fixes for the global environmental crisis. The aim of the thesis is to shed light on the importance of context in mediating relationships between humans and other-than-humans, as well as to consider whether this interspecies sociality might have implications on understandings of personhood in the West. Fungi are a distinct kingdom of organisms, which include mushrooms. In this thesis, the term “mushroom” is used to refer to the visible fruiting bodies of a larger subterranean organism called the mycelium. Mushrooms are picked for sale, consumption, and various other purposes in many countries, and mushroom picking is a common hobby in Finland. The ethnographic data for this thesis was gathered through fieldwork among recreational mushroomers from the Greater Helsinki region over the period of two autumns in 2019 and 2020. This fieldwork comprised of participant observation with sixteen mushroom enthusiasts, supplemented by four recorded unstructured interviews. The ethnographic focus of the thesis is on how humans who engage in mushroom picking express their knowledge of the connections between different lifeforms, and how things like emotion, memory and experience inform their movement and decision-making in the forest. There is a special emphasis on how mushroomers speak about and to mushrooms, and how they describe their appearance and behavior. The primary theoretical framework for the thesis builds on Tim Ingold’s work in environmental anthropology, with a focus on the notion of dwelling. The dwelling perspective is employed to gain a comprehensive understanding of the interconnectedness of different lifeforms within their material environments. Special consideration is given to how the concept of “place” is created by—and conversely mediates—human–mushroom relationships. In this thesis, place is seen as a temporal concept fundamentally emergent in practice, created by an interplay of human and other-than-human activity in a material environment over time. The ethnographic evidence presented in this thesis points to significant sociality, respect, personification, and care between human mushroom pickers and mushrooms. Examples of such sociality range from the use of respectful and caring language in describing mushrooms, to directly speaking to the mushrooms themselves. Furthermore, the ethnographic data include examples of how mushroom pickers perceive mushroom behavior, appearance, and intentionality, and commonly use anthropomorphic language to describe them. The question of other-than-human personhood is discussed in relation to these observations, and the thesis suggests that mushrooms may indeed be considered relational persons within these highly social contexts. Sociality between humans and other species is often overlooked in research on Western societies, especially when it comes to fungi and other non-animals. The thesis presents an example of an attentive and respectful relationship between humans and other lifeforms within a contemporary Western sociocultural context and is thus positioned against the prevalent idea of a hyperseparation between nature and culture in the West.