Paper short abstract:

This paper presents an ethnographic exploration of GMFuturos, a multi- and inter-disciplinary project run from Durham University to study agricultural biotechnologies in the Global South (Macnaghten and Carro-Ripalda 2015).

Paper long abstract:

This paper will present an ethnographic exploration of GMFuturos, a multi- and inter-disciplinary project run from Durham University and funded by the John Templeton Foundation to study debates and governance surrounding agricultural biotechnologies in the Global South (Macnaghten and Carro-Ripalda 2015). This inter- and multi-disciplinary project involved anthropologists, human and physical geographers, sociologists, philosophers, plant biologists, theologians, and agro-ecologists, distributed among four teams in four countries (UK, Mexico, Brazil and India). As co-leader, coordinator of the research teams, and project manager, I was not only an active player in the day-to-day enactments of inter-disciplinary diplomacy, but was also a privileged observer of fruitful collaborations, blurred boundaries, respected distances and unresolved disagreements between the particular disciplinary theories, practices and ethics. In addition, I will explore the disciplinary politics and knowledge hierarchies that made certain forms of practice, analytical frames, and modes of writing prevail over others, but I will also look at the inter-personal and rhetorical experiences of day-to-day interdisciplinary work and micro-collaboration with other researchers, and how these may have opened up new forms of inquiring and understanding for many of us involved in the project.