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space, demarcated by its objects, its other participants, its ways of doing, its locations, its

movements, its instructions’ (Hennion 2007, p. 108). This means that an attachment is not

just between two entities – a fisherman and a trap for instance – it involves an assemblage. A

fisherman’s subjectivity/personhood is therefore co-produced through that network of

attachments. Callon and Rabeharisoa illustrate this when they described the webbed nature of

attachments (2004). For their case study of a patient who refuses to accept ‘lessons of

genetics’, they suggest that a subject’s moral position is connected to accepting certain forms

of knowledge (2004, pp. 16-17). That is, both the moral position and form of knowledge are

part of the same web of relations and possible subjectivities (Callon & Rabeharisoa 2004, pp.

16-17). It is the extensive and webbed attachments of the tonnara that are disregarded by the

regulatory and commercial apparatuses that I have so far described. This suggests that by

identifying certain components (trap) as important to the tonnara and disregarding others

(mattanza) there is a rupture in a wider network in which forms of life are produced.

Many people I spoke with reflected on the work and the mattanza of the past. Luigi

said in the 1990s there was a different way of working, it was very demanding as ‘we used

the same methods of a thousand years ago. Everything was done by hand. Now it is simpler

but less satisfying’ (2013, pers. comm. 18 June). Many of the men who I spoke with reflected

on the mattanza and the hard work of the past with tenderness, invigoration, pride and care.

As Clemente recalled, this work ‘moved’ him. Giuliano confided that he had lost the will for

the work. The work has changed so much, he said while reminiscing about his original

motivations for the tonnara. He described the feeling of doing a mattanza – of the blood on

the harbour, the adrenalin, and all the people waiting on the shore for the tuna to arrive. He

said:

…it’s just not the same work now. Back then you would finish the day and your
head wouldn’t be tired like now. It was more physical. Now there are so many
rules, business has changed. (2013, pers. comm. 12 June)

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