What is Dirt?

The author argues that the question, ‘What isdirt’ is closely tied up with the question, ‘What is a thing, what is anordinary object’. Our everyday life with objects inescapably involves a dimensionof value. Philosophical reflection on dirt and soiling is instructive exactlybecause it demonstrates the limits of any simplified contrast between‘objective’ and ‘subjective’, ‘symbolic’ or ‘constructed’. Our relations withthe material environment are more interesting than that.