Human/animal atmospheres: attuning to ontologies with young people in the natural history museum and the zoo

Human-induced environmental destruction introduces shifts in our understanding of human-nature relations, while it also is felt as a crisis of affects and emotion. This research explores the interplay between ontology and affect by focusing on more-than-human atmospheres. We invited groups of children and young people to join our research on changing nature relations in a natural history museum and a zoo. Combining elements drawn from atmospheric and multispecies inquiries and art-based approaches, we attuned to the atmospheres evolving around other than human animals and their representations. We used the concept of atmosphere to analyse the material and affective making of the human/animal distinction and scientific subjects and objects. We also experimented with atmospheres in arts-based activities to generate disruptions to this distinction and the established notions of science, conservation and education. In discussion with young people, the theme of extinction highlighted connections between human exceptionalism and an existential loneliness. We argue that the concept of atmospheres adds ontological and ecological sensitivity in research on nature relations and young people's contemporary lives. By unsettling conventional notions of time, space and individual emotions, and by embracing the nonhuman, this concept enriches our repertoire of grappling with the multispecies ecological crises.