Lukáš is a doctoral student at the Charles University (Faculty of Social Science; Department of Sociology) and a researcher at the Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Science. He just finished his third year of dissertation research concerned with human-fungi coexistence. His dissertation project is a continuation of his diploma thesis titled “A wolf is waiting behind the fence. Multispecies coexistence in Broumovsko region in the Anthropocene” (2020), which received the award for the best diploma thesis from the Czech Association for Social Anthropology. Using multispecies ethnography, he explores how the return of wolves reconfigures the nature-culture collectives and practices, including local pastoralism, biopolitical decisions, and ecosystem management. In his dissertation ethnographic fieldwork, based in Czechia, he focuses on the diverse and multiple entanglements of people and mushrooms (and other creatures), in particular on mushroom cultivation, including of medicinal mushrooms, and foraging practices, which have a long tradition in the country.
He studied for several years at the Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague and later worked in documentary filmmaking. He occasionally collaborates on the development of documentary film synopses and works part-time as the head of the essay section of the literary journal Tvar. Recently, he has been engaged as an expert consultant on a feature documentary movie on probiotic approaches to ecological management. The Visiting Fellowship at the CSSM will be a great opportunity to discuss and further develop his attempts at collaborations between the social sciences and the arts. He suppose that this “interdisciplinary fermentation” can contribute to the knowledge production about contemporary modes of life beyond the human.
Lukáš stayed at the CSSM in October 2023.
