Visceral Ecologies in the Borderland: Soils and Care from Olive Trees’ Hecatomb in Salento

Abstract

This contribution focuses on Soils and Care as fundamental matters of inquiry in order to retrace the processes determining the resurging possibilities of Salento’s landscape. The South-East Italian territory is plagued by the epidemic of bacteria Xylella Fastidiosa, cause for hundreds of thousands of olive-trees’ deaths. We embark on the untangling of the ecology of the olive trees’ depletion, taking into consideration the most recent scientific research on the main vector of the bacteria, the little spittlebug Philaenus spumarius. We refer to Visceral Ecology as the quality of relationships that entangles multispecies assemblies. With this effort we interlace the vector’s ecology and the dying of olive trees with a local oil miller’s intestinal disease. Framing the soil of Salento as an “open air intestine” allows us to merge materialistic views and practices of care with the ecosystem’s transformations. In conclusion, we argue the interconnectedness of Materialism and Care in shaping both the imaginary and the conditions for futurable local human-landscape relations.