Jón Þór Pétursson
This paper focuses on the microbiopolitics of skyr and the maker cultures that skyr-making practices engender. Dating back before Iceland’s settlement in the 9th century, the co-production of skyr in the dairy by Icelandic women and live bacterial cultures of skyr provides a prime example of long-term symbiosis between microbial cultures and human cultures.
Through archival research and interviews, I investigate how practitioners see their skyr practices in light of past traditions and future prospects for healthy sustainable living as part of the “probiotic zeitgeist”, and how sociality, community, identity and emotional bonding is achieved through these ecological interactions.
In recent years, skyr has morphed from everyday staple to national food heritage and global superfood. Slow Food added skyr to its “Ark of Taste” in 2007 and emphasized that the main differences between traditional skyr and its industrialized counterpart are, first, the use of a pinch of older skyr to make a new batch and, second, a lengthy preparation time due to older methods of straining. Making skyr the old-fashioned way is to slow down the process, breaking away from the frantic pace of contemporary life and the industrial food system. Through this definition of traditional skyr, the microbial cultures emerge as the bearers of tradition and guarantors of historical continuity.
The paper examines the value of human-microbial collaboration and how microbial cultures engender and maintain human cultural practices. Skyr making highlights the social value of inter-species symbiosis between humans and microbes, or the reciprocal, co-evolutionary relationships between life forms.
