Paper short abstract:

From the analyses of European and Portuguese policies and strategies for the Sea, this paper explores how surfers and fishermen in Ericeira resist or negotiate those governance plans, giving rise to local narratives shaped by seawater which moves between concepts of conservation and economic growth.

Paper long abstract:

This paper reflects the impact of sea heritagization in Ericeira - whose waves are a World Surfing Reserve since 2011 - and analyses how the idea of the sea as a common global patrimony interchanges with the local practices of surfing and fishing, reconfiguring discourses about materiality and daily activities (Daugbjerg e Fibiger 2011) in a consequent participation of the community in patrimonial management.

Once my investigation observes the existing continuities and ruptures generated by this heritagization process and considers that the globalizing practices and deliberations of the authorized discourse are not intrinsically more important than the local perspectives, in this paper it will be explored how the actions of all actors involved, by resisting or negotiating those global policies, create new narratives about sea heritage, nature preservation and economic growth which shapes daily activities of labour, sports and leisure in this fishing village and Portuguese surf mecca.

Also, because both surf and fishing, as practices constituted in the "lived experience" can create a challenge to the established categories, this proposal intends to consolidate an ontology of being surfer and fisherman that manifests itself through sea literacy. Furthermore, if we think about the relation between the man-sea encounter and the plurality of continuously recreating policies, maybe it can contribute to a sea epistemology (Ingersoll 2016) that echoes a transformative process where the natural environment converges with the human relations involved.