suomen antropologi | volume 45 issue 2 summer 2020 45 Agnese Bankovska LECTIO PRÆCURSORIA 1 Patchworks of care: Ethics and practice of care in the organic food movement in Latvia November 25 th , 2020, University of Helsinki A lectio præcursoria is a short presentation read out loud by a doctoral candidate at the start of a public thesis examination in Finland. It introduces the key points or central argument of the thesis in a way that should make the ensuing discussion between the examinee and the examiner apprehensible to the audience, many of whom may be unfamiliar with the candidate’s research or even anthropological research in general. Honoured Custos, honoured Opponent, ladies and gentlemen, I am happy to welcome you to this online defence. Allow me to open this introductory lecture with an ethnographic description: One day, when the new soil has been delivered and distributed among the seed trays and small plastic boxes, Jurģis, one of my key research participants heads out to sow a new batch of radish and mustard. Ieva, his wife, tells me to follow him to observe the speed and dexterity with which he works. She speaks admiringly, admitting she could not do the process half as well. As I observe, I see clearly what Ieva meant by highly trained skills, something illustrated mainly by Jurģis’ hand movements. His hand opens and crinkly radish and rounded mustard seeds scatter across the fat surface of the soil in the small plastic box. Te process is fast; more and more boxes are flled with radish and mustard and piled in towers next to each other. Te process seems so simple performed by Jurģis but this is only in appearance. In reality, it might take months and maybe even several planting seasons until one learns to grab the right amount of seed and perform the correct swaying movement of the hand so that the seeds scatter evenly and do not accumulate on the sides or in cracks in the soil. When I ask how the soil is made so fat, Jurģis demonstrates the technique, pressing a full box onto a freshly flled box to obtain a level surface. Te right amount of seed is crucial, according to Jurģis, who says that some of their competitors are over-flling boxes, which creates an unpleasant aroma as rot sets in faster in the densely planted boxes. On Ieva and Jurģis’ farm, with more than 100 diferent crops, the skills are obtained and extended, inter-developed and interchanged. Vicky Singleton and John Law (2013) argue that the changing circumstances of farming materialities play an essential role in the accumulation through repetition of such everyday caring, as the materiality on the farm is itself heterogeneous. For Jurģis such everyday materialities include plants in their diferent stages: seeds, seedlings, partially and fully grown plants. Soil, water, and scissors, as well