When Birds Speak with Humans: The present tense of shorebird migration

In this article, the author and artist, Barbara Campbell, assumes the role of participant-observer, one who is always performing in knowledge and view of other actants in the field. In this case, the actants are human and other-than-human. Campbell begins with a thick description of an intense period she spent at the Broome Bird Observatory, Western Australia where she joined other humans to watch shorebirds on their long journey north. She then draws on Actor Network Theorist Bruno Latour and philosopher Michel Serres to reflect on the range of interspecies interlocutions found there.A series of large performative charcoal drawings by Campbell accompanies the article.