Paper short abstract:

Friendship is constituted between and through other social engagements. In meshwork, the lines of friendship knot with those of other intimate (and non-intimate) relations (Ingold 2011). This paper sketches the ways that bodily experiences and affect have shaped relationships central to my research.

Paper long abstract:

Friendship, more than just a dyadic relationship, is constituted around, between and through other social engagements. Friendships bind individuals together in what Ingold terms the "entangled lines of life, growth and movement" (2011:63). Meshwork addresses these lines: "[i]t is in the binding together of lines, not in the connecting of points, that the mesh is constituted" (2007: 152). In meshwork, the lines of friendship knot with those of other intimate (and non-intimate) relations. While these knots may be structurally supportive - so that particular relations might enable others- they also hold tensions in relation to the marital and kin (inter alia) relationships of both individuals.

Friendship and related non-romantic intimate relationships are supported by the sharing of sensory experiences enabled by bodily co-presence, and the emotional care that friendships often provide supplemented by non-verbal as well as verbal interactions (Bowlby 2011, 611). Relatedly, the affective implications of physical interactions can shape the practices and longevity of friendship: the failure to attend special events; extended avoidance or absences from contact; and frank expressions of anger, can rupture or rend friendships, in potentially permanent ways.

In the course of a project looking at intimate relationships beyond the family, I have spent approximately eight months over the last five years conducting interviews and fieldwork in a range of places in urban western Japan. Focusing on the relationships flowing from and through one such place, a café in western Japan, I became aware of the particular weight of affect on the lines of intimate engagement. How do those engaged in social research make sense of their own contribution to these relationships? What are the implications of bodily co-presence and affect in the making of relationships in the field, and in the mapping and maintenance of meshwork? This paper addresses these questions, sketching some of the ways that bodily experiences and affect have shaped relationships central to my research: both the intimate relationships formed between informants, and those between myself and informants.