Of Primates’ Bodies: Forms of Human-Other Primate Intercorporeality

Abstract

As a foray into the material connections between humans and other primates, we use this chapter to argue that human bodies can be understood as the product of material interactions between species rather than bounded entities constituted by their differences. Exploring primate bodies as research tools, as food and kin, and as memory, we draw from Haraway, Bateson, and Latour to demonstrate how bodies are less defined by the boundaries of the skin and more so through their material and social interactions and the sharing of corporeal substances and experiences. Ultimately, we contend that at stake in a consideration of these material and bodily interactions is our very humanness as we humans realize that we have never been just human.