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Paper short abstract:

This presentation discusses the fermentation imaginaries’ impact on the body of gender and kinship and, vice versa, that is the impact of the ideological constructions of gender and kinship on the natural processes of fermentation, in a shepherd and matrilocal society of the Cyclades, during the 90s

Paper long abstract:

The interrelation of sexual intercourse, menstrual blood, embryos and fermented substances in a Greek matrilocal shepherd community brings in the foreground an all passing interconnection between the fermentation micro-ecologies and the human body ecologies, narratives and imaginaries, which take for granted the strong ties between fermentation and human reproduction.

The fermented substances’ odour, such as the one emitted from a wine barrel opening, may be blamed for miscarriages and, yet, the odour of the cheese called “male”, is able to save pregnant women from miscarriages. What these odours have in common is that they are generated from fermented substances or processes of fermentation. The intervention of fermented substances to the gestation period may open the way to think of gestation as a kind of fermentation, especially if we take in consideration that sexual intercourse may spoil in turn the sourdough fermentation process. What is the common ground that permits these narratives and imaginaries and facts? Human body functions and fermentation processes seem inextricably correlated life procedures. The system of kinship in this type of matrilocal community seems mediated by the microbial agency of the fermentation imaginaries and vice versa, intermingling fermentation and conception, in other words the microbial agency and the system of kinship or the ideological construction of natural procedures.