Living with Plants: Hilal Alkan speaks with Laurens Schlicht about Care, Migration, and Multispecies Relations

The conversation centres on the multifaceted relations of care that connect humans and plants in contexts of migration. Hilal Alkan is particularly interested in practices of “emplacement” – that is, how people situate themselves in new places and come to feel at home. As part of her research, Hilal Alkan visited people in their homes and gardens and invited them to show her their plants. Her interlocutors spoke about where the plants came from, how they were cared for, and what stories and memories were connected to them. In the conversation, Hilal Alkan also describes this method as “plant-prompted life story collection”