Writing Fungal Flesh

"We don't always realize the damage our words can do to others. Lately, I've been thinking about how rarely affective correspondences are taken into account when we write-especially in academic settings. In scholarly writing, we're trained to prioritize factual accuracy, citational rigor, and structural stability. Yet, in doing so, we often relegate sensitivity and playfulness-what María Lugones would call the capacity for loving perception -to a secondary plane."

"We forget that the messages we send into the world are not inert: they carry life energy. Our words can warm, kindle, or scorch, depending on the manner of their release. Writing, after all, is a form of metamorphic breathing-our words are received by other nervous systems, other pulsating heart chambers. What might it mean to write in a way that touches, that imbues with vibrant energy rather than defends? To let language soften, wander, and risk intimacy?"

Academic writing prioritizes factual accuracy, citational rigor, and structural stability. Those priorities often marginalize sensitivity and playfulness, reducing the capacity for loving perception. Words carry life energy and affect other nervous systems; they can warm, kindle, or scorch depending on delivery. Writing can function as metamorphic breathing that touches readers' hearts and minds. Transformative work requires rejecting agonistic habits of domination and the precision that wounds. Writing can choose softness, wandering rhythms, and risked intimacy to imbue language with vibrant energy. Attuning phrasing, rhythm, and affective textures can shape how words touch and relate to readers.

Read at Apaonline