In Khuzestan, Iran, Conocarpus erectus, a nonendemic, fast-growing evergreen tree species with rich foliage has been widely planted to fight the consequences of extractivism, war, and climate change. The trees were supposed to form a physical barrier to the dust-laden winds while releasing oxygen to alleviate air pollution. Yet the roots of the tree destroyed infrastructure and its pollen proved even more hazardous, provoking asthma attacks in large parts of the population. Hence the tree that was planted to ease breathing became a source of respiratory harm. This article investigates the affordances of the Conocarpus as a living being and its changing value as a 'lively commodity' at the intersections of extractivism, political economy, and human health. It traces the life and death journeys of the tree as it is degraded within the 'hierarchy of breathers' and pushed into abjection, as those who employed it as a green fix did not acknowledge it as a vegetal being with unique characteristics, and affordances.
Based on ten months of ethnographic fieldwork with a grassroots self-injury support organisation in the North of England, this paper examines how ethical priorities shape decisions about wound care among people who practice self-injury. Drawing on in-depth engagement with three participants-Julie, Eliza and Nuala-this paper explores how values of agency, autonomy, and wound/body ownership are prioritised over biomedical imperatives to heal wounds efficiently and to restore bodily health. While clinical frameworks often understand these practices as 'non-compliance,' this paper shows how autonomous wound-management practices function as ethical strategies through which individuals assert control, maintain psychosocial balance and navigate their moral responsibilities towards themselves and others.
In this paper, we discuss the practical and moral complexities of diagnostic-seeking pathways for three uncertain medical conditions: fibromyalgia, myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), and long COVID. We analyse qualitative data collected in the UK between 2023 and 2025, comprising in-depth interviews with medical professionals, researchers, and patients, as well as documentary sources. Drawing on the anthropology and sociology of diagnosis, this paper discusses how chronic illness can be marked by challenging and unstable pathways, influenced by the organisation of the medical system and the resources patients have to navigate it. Diagnoses further do not guarantee a solution to the condition, and can, on the other hand, produce stigma. Medical professionals recognise the uncertain nature of these conditions and emphasise how diagnosis can play an instrumental role in providing patients with access to therapies, benefits, or acceptance. Patients discuss the complexity of the strategies they deploy not only to obtain a diagnosis but also to navigate the practical and moral complexities associated with their condition. Analysing the practical and moral complexity of diagnostic-seeking pathways represents a way to enrich anthropological reflections on diagnosis by demonstrating how this key concept of biomedicine is strongly influenced by social, economic, and moral, as well as biological, factors.
