Paper short abstract:

This paper explains how digital tools such as GPS, cameras, hydrophones are deployed in whale watching contexts to both find whales and support scientific research, considering some of the tensions this produces.

Paper long abstract:

Today, there is often significant overlap between whale watching, or ‘cetourism’ (Neves 2010) and scientific efforts to study cetaceans (the word for whales, dolphins, and porpoises). Research trips at sea are extremely costly, time-limited, and often scuppered by bad weather and sea conditions, whereas cetourism companies operate on a more regular schedule throughout the year. The sheer number of hours spent at sea yields good access to seasonal data on cetaceans’ precise locations, behaviours, and unique markings (e.g., dorsal fins of orcas and tail flukes of sperm and humpback whales, which are photographed for ID catalogues). Tours can even provide opportunities to collect samples, for instance of faeces and skin. Secondly, cetourism operators tend to preferentially employ biology graduates who are themselves interested in cetacean research. No matter how rough the sea conditions or how cold their hands were, guides I knew while conducting ethnographic fieldwork in the Azores (Portugal) and Northern Norway would dutifully write on clipboards, take ID photos, record audio clips into their phones, and occasionally fly drones to capture data. Finally, tour companies will make use of scientific technologies and instruments, such as sonar, radar, and hydrophones (underwater microphones) to find whales to watch. This paper outlines how such gear mediates the slippage between research and tourism and discusses some of the tensions it produces, as the two do not always align. It further considers what the consequences might be of knowing whales through increasingly digital means, proposing that these can function as ‘domesticating’ tools.