About bending over their own soil... an invitation to Michel Henry's Phenomenology of Life in time of climate catastrophe

Abstract

The work intends to bring concepts from Henry’s work closer to current and worrisome ecological issues. For that, it brings some aspects of the thought of the eco-philosopher David Abram regarding the sensitization of our flesh to the co-belonging to the Earth. The second strand is outlined by the thought of journalist Eliane Brum, especially in the work Banzeiro-Òkòtó. It discusses her immersion in the Amazon and her process of “foresting herself” in contact with those populations and threats of destruction. Her testimony is related to the processes of forgetfulness of life and the detours announced by Henry in “Barbarism”. Creative movements in the face of climate collapse, named with the neologism “rexistence”, are related to the concepts of corpropriation and modalization of suffering. In this way, the phenomenology of Life is invited to include life that is given as nature and, thus, contribute to the understanding and confrontation of what currently threatens the lives of humans and more-than-humans.