Sociomateriality in Posthuman Practice Theory

A posthumanist practice theory – which grants equal status to humans and non-humans – provides the context for a discussion of the concept of sociomaterial practices. The constitutive entanglement of the social and the material within a practice is illustrated in three different contexts. I start by focusing on the sociomateriality of bodies in the social practice of fathering. I then consider a working practice and its technological change in the case of artificial nutrition. In the last case, I discuss the disruption of social practices that Hurricane Katrina brought about and how it made visible the interconnection between past and present practices. In all the three cases, the materialities of bodies, technologies, discourses could not be separated from the society that formed them, and vice versa the social cannot be considered external or separate from materialities.