Abstract:
The Japanese word waza (技), usually translated as "technique" or "skill", helps to highlight the distinction between know-how and know how. The hyphen makes all the difference : if anyone can quickly learn and know how to make a pottery, it takes time, practice and a specific complexion to acquire a know-how in pottery. Between knowing how to do something and acquiring a specific know-how in a field of practice, there is a huge gap, of the same nature as the one between environment and ambient world. In both cases, it is a matter of coexistence, confidence, and meaning.
Bio:
Yoann Moreau is a freelance anthropologist and professional playwright. He is the author of Living in the fluidity. An Ethnographer on the Stilts in the Brazilian Amazon River (2001) and Living with Disasters (2017). Since 2016, he lives in Yagisawa (Izu Peninsula, Japan) where he is experiencing mesography, a fieldwork dedicated to the making of ambient worlds (fūdo, 風土). Most recently, he has published "Our Diplomatic Bodies" (2019), "Riding the Earthworm. Rhythmic Inferences among the Living, in Japan" (2020), and "Through the milieu (fûdo), a craftsman's path" (2021).