This paper deconstructs toxicity through a juxtaposition of a conventional epidemiological approach to pollutants and the lived experience of a highly polluted residential area next to the largest steel production plant in Europe. An ethnographic analysis of toxicity in Taranto illustrates the complexity of various temporal scales through which toxic chemicals contribute to new biological, political and moral balances. Attuning to the slow experiences of pollution is fundamental to shed light on the processes moulding aspirations to environmental justice within the community. In particular, law and bureaucracy imbue pollutants with experiential legitimacy, allowing them to be seen, contested and collectivized. I focus on the residents’ and workers’ dissonant experiences with the bureaucratic system to illustrate how their encounter with asbestos has profoundly shaped toxic exposure to less bureaucratically visible shapeshifting pollutants, thus contributing to a diffused sense of political resignation.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.