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- Convenors:
-
Marta Gentilucci
(Centre Universitaire de formation et de recherche de Mayotte)
Raffaele Maddaluno (University of Rome La Sapienza)
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- Discussants:
-
Johanna Markkula
(Central European University)
Géraldine Le Roux (Université de Bretagne Occidentale)
- Formats:
- Panel
- Mode:
- Face-to-face
- Sessions:
- Tuesday 23 July, -, -
Time zone: Europe/Madrid
Short Abstract:
In trying to (un)doing anthropology we explore the conceptual and physical experiences of displacement at sea. The aim is to investigate how our encounters with the sea can redefine the approach to ethnography while providing a displaced perspective on global economic and geopolitical dynamics.
Long Abstract:
The ocean has become a symbolic hub for scientific knowledge and future orientations sparking a growing anthropological interest. However, delving into the intricate, ever-changing dynamics of maritime contexts and the global unpredictability of the seas calls for reassembling conventional anthropological frameworks.
In trying to (un)doing anthropology starting from ethnographies of the seas, this panel explores: What does it mean to engage in the anthropology of the seas, whether it's being immersed in the sea itself or adopting a sea-based perspective? How can anthropology's methodological frameworks, characterized by extended timelines and micro-situated research, be adapted to the ever-shifting maritime environment? In what ways does ethnography transform when research spans multiple settings, shifting between on-shore and off-shore locations? How does the ethnographic approach evolve when we conduct research aboard ships, studying phenomena such as elements, automation, labour, containerization, extraction? Furthermore, in this very crowded oceanic environment how can anthropology be disassembled and reassembled to make its voice louder in the global maritime discourses? To what extent are scientists from other disciplines, as well as advisors of international organizations, receptive to the dilated time frames inherent in ethnography and oceans?
We welcome papers that explore the experiences of displacement (Jue 2020), drawing from both ethnographic research and theoretical reflections. We recognize the potential of this concept to emphasize not only the physical relocations we encounter at sea but also as a stimulus for imagining ourselves in a state of perpetual movement, navigating peripheral pathways towards an "otherwise anthropology" (McTighe and Raschig 2019).
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Tuesday 23 July, 2024, -Minji Song (University of California, Berkeley) Elisabeth Schober (University of Oslo)
Paper short abstract:
We discuss the affective force behind "Tears of Malmö", the evocative nickname of a gantry crane that made its way from Malmö, Sweden to Ulsan, South Korea in 2002. Via two theatre plays, we analyze the moving crane's resonances in global shipbuilding as an example of “infrastructures of feeling”.
Paper long abstract:
“Tears of Malmö” is the evocative nickname of a gantry crane used in shipbuilding, which made its way from Malmö, Sweden to its new home in Ulsan, South Korea in 2002. By narrating the story of the crane, and the many rumors around it, we make a contribution to the anthropology of infrastructure and affect, adding our material to a growing literature that focuses on “infrastructures of feeling”. By looking into the emotional sway of the large-scale piece of metal that travelled across the world via the lens of two theatre plays, we consider the affective force behind the moving crane, which is a clear stand-in not just for the transformation and geographical dislocation of an entire industry, but also for the emotional turmoil caused by the invisibilization of labour on two continents.
Alejandro Limpo González (University of Southamtpon)
Paper short abstract:
Remote sensing technologies and the territorial formations that thrive on it call for a realignment of our ethnographic attention to the image-being of planetary bodies of water. I will introduce 'The Environmental Image Complex' as a framework for charting the visual politics of ocean observation.
Paper long abstract:
This research, situated at the confluence of Science and Technology Studies (STS) and ethnography, investigates the transformation of oceans and seas into image-data assemblages. I draw on multi-situated fieldwork spanning diverse institutional settings dedicated to ocean perception. Focusing on the intersection of networked visuality and data images, the presentation underscores the pivotal role played by visual media in shaping governance and knowledge about the ocean.The fundamental question posed is how to comprehensively account for the diverse encounters generated by remote sensing and computer technology with the Anthropocene Ocean (Deloghrey, 2019, Lehman 2022). The proliferation of intelligent systems and sensors for ocean observation, coupled with the territorial implications embedded in these "image spaces" necessitates a realignment of ethnographic attention toward the image-being of planetary bodies of water.
By introducing the concept of the Environmental Image Complex (EIC), this research establishes an ethnographic compass to navigate the intricate landscape of ocean observation image politics. The EIC exists at the edge of multiple displacements, including the shift from human vision to machine forms of image analysis, from images to energy capture and processing (remote sensing), and from terrestrially nurtured models of governance to the meteorological becoming of sea states.This presentation will illuminate technologies, institutions, networks, hubs, think-tanks, and governance models constituting the Environmental Image Complex. By weaving these elements together, the ethnographic picture of Ocean Perception emerges, shedding light on the intricate dynamics at play in the interface of technology, imagery, and the ecological challenges posed by the Anthropocene Ocean.
Cecilie Vindal Ødegaard (University of Bergen)
Paper short abstract:
This paper discusses the changing relationships between ship and desk functions, as decision-making is ‘onshored’ through digitalization. How do these relocations affect work organization, value and (in)visibilities of labor at sea? How can we explore an emerging 'present absence' of humans at sea?
Paper long abstract:
Ongoing automation and digitalization in the maritime industry is characterized by a ‘double maneuver’ transcending the land-sea binary in new ways: On the one hand, there is an intensified orientation towards the sea for ‘blue growth’, and a simultaneous maneuver towards land on the other, e.g. through the ‘onshoring’ of functions through digital technologies and automation. This ‘onshoring’ is facilitated by investments in and developments of digital technologies in shipping and beyond and entails that various functions, such as risk assessment, surveillance, and decision-making, are (partially) moved onshore. This paper discusses the changing relationship between ship and desk functions and labor, by focusing on introductions of digital technologies in a Norwegian-owned shipping company. It sees digitalization as a significantly spatial and socio-technical practice and asks how ‘onshoring’ in the shipping industry affects work organization, representations, and (in)visibilities in the workplace. The paper explores the various forms of relocation that digitalized ‘onshoring’ entails: First, as a (partial) displacement of work functions and labor from ship to desk or control room and second, through a disembedding of digital representations from their originating physical objects, qualities, or processes at sea, to other locations. How do these relocations affect work organization, value, and (in)visibilities of labor at sea? How can we think and rethink anthropological methods by examining digital and other relocations at sea? And more generally: How can we explore and understand what appears to be an emerging notion of ‘present absence’ of humans at sea?
Yifang Chen (National Dong Hwa University)
Paper short abstract:
Taiwan is surrounded by the ocean, but interestingly we have few marine anthropologists. However, we do have various connections with the sea. This paper attempts to explore the possibilities when we move on from the land towards the sea, and show what we can learn from there.
Paper long abstract:
Taiwan is an island country in East Asia. The area is 36,197 sq km, and the coastline is 1566.3 km. The east coast of the island is by the west Pacific Ocean.
Artisans of Kavalan people, one of the sixteen indigenous peoples of Taiwan, let the natural-dyeing cloth drift in the sea to obtain pretty colour. Pangcah and Kavalan peoples have rituals related to the sea. Dolphin and whale watching is very popular in eastern Taiwan, the coast by the Pacific Ocean, and photographers capture the images of these marine creatures.
Also, younger generation set up a company to advocate sustainable fishery and eating fish properly for a better future of the ocean. Meanwhile, offshore wind turbines are built as green energy. But there is always tension between offshore wind turbines and fishery (and the ecosystem of the coast).
This paper will examine the relationship between people and sea. I will work with people who have deep relations with the sea, and examine what they feel and learn in the sea. And what makes them so much tie up with the sea? I will also work with people who are so far away from the sea, and try to find out what keeps them away.
It is expected that the anthropological observation and experience of Taiwan can be thought-provoking to the international societies.
Javed Kaisar (Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology)
Paper short abstract:
The paper focuses on Bhasan Char's dynamic coastal landscape, shaped by sediment and sand. It examines how the sea influences urban development, livelihoods, and the future of Rohingyas, with a specific emphasis on coastal protection infrastructures and maintenance work.
Paper long abstract:
The Bangladeshi government invested over 300 million dollars to convert Bhasan Char, a recently formed sedimented island in the Bay of Bengal, into the world's largest refugee camp for Rohingyas from Myanmar, currently residing in Bangladesh under ostensibly temporary conditions. Despite concerns over safety and the characterization as an 'open jail,' the government promises to enhance the Rohingyas' quality of life on this cyclone-prone island, emphasizing "climate-resilient infrastructure" and livelihood opportunities. The granular nature of sediment and sand provides a conceptual framework for interpreting Bhasan Char as a constantly shifting or uncertain urban landscape, actively shaped by material properties characterized by granularity and fluidity (Kothari & Arnall, 2020; Dawson, 2023). This paper explores the dynamic interplay of the role of sea on the space to elucidate influences on urban accumulations, livelihoods, and the Rohingyas' future on the island. With a focus on the Rohingyas' future within this precarious landscape, the paper centers on coastal protection infrastructures and the work of maintenance (Gupta, 2018; 2021). This focused inquiry aids in understanding the dynamic nature of the urban milieu adjacent to the sea and its intricate entanglements with human, non-human, and environment. Additionally, the study probes tensions and struggles in response to speculative futures in Bhasan Char, conceived as a camp city by the sea. Rooted in an ongoing ethnographic framework, this research forms part of a PhD project aims to unfold layered processes of politics, socio-ecological transformation, aesthetics, and governance in the intricate relations between Rohingyas and the Bangladesh state.
Aurélie Darbouret (EHESS-CNRS)
Paper short abstract:
What do we perceive of anthropogenic pressures underwater? This presentation examines the potential of underwater sounds to describe human presences, and to question the perceptions of marine pollution by different actors, offshore the industrial-port of Marseille metropolis and a National Park.
Paper long abstract:
What do we perceive of anthropogenic pressures underwater? This paper examines the potential of sounds to unveil multi-species interactions under the surface, and to question the perceptions of marine pollution, offshore the industrial port metropolis and a National Park, in trouble with massive tourism.
At sea, humans, cargo ships, cables, fishes, invertebrates and algae circulate, entangle and aggregate in invisible and inaudible ways (Tsing, 2013).
This paper presents the preliminary findings of an ongoing multimodal and interdisciplinary research project (Preshumer) on interactions with more-than-human beings, with a primary focus on sounds perspectives (Kirksey & Helmreich, 2010, Barry 2021).
This research examines the perceptions and representations of multispecies interactions in a context of direct and indirect anthropogenic impacts in the Gulf of Marseille - varied pollutions, exogen species invasion, mass mortality due to underwater heat waves, extension of activities increasing noise - but also in a context of “nature based” programs of care and restoration.
How sound approaches un/redo anthropology to move beyond a human-centred perspective toward interdependences and entangled relationships with marine creatures?
Attempting to adopt a “wet ontology” (Steinberg & Peters 2015) and approaching marine interactions through sounds at sea, challenges sensitive perception of space, time, human, non-human and life (Helmreich 2015).
Through methodological experimentation at sea, mobilizing hydrophones, go-pro cameras and collaborative approaches of audio recordings, this paper explores how modification of perceptions at sea displaces researchers and actors and engage them in new forms of relationality (Feld 2010) with elusive living beings.
Paul Buquet (UMR CNRS 6590 GDR Omer Université Rennes 2)
Paper short abstract:
Through an anthropological approach of cinema and an ethnography of scientific shootings, this communication aims at studying the imagination integrated (or developed) by scientists during the apprehension of underwater seascapes and the establishment of evidence and theories in marine sciences.
Paper long abstract:
Forged over the last three decades, the cross disciplinary concept of « underwater seascape » (Musard, Le Dû-Blayo et al. 2014) continues to show his heuristic potential in the light of economical, legal, environmental and social sciences. In despite of the latest and controversial issues of their exploitation (Gentilucci, 2022), the underwater seascapes — from the littoral zones to the deep seas — remain only known to a few researchers, techno-scientists and, furthermore : through a massive set of tools, optical frames and filters.
Several papers have previously underlined, in terms of embodied skills, the tactile dimension of the epipelagic area (Artaud, 2023), but what about the twilight and bathypelagic zones ?
To bounce back on the inaugurals works of Stefan Helmreich on “microbial seas” (2009) and Jérémie Brugidou on the semiotic of bioluminescence (2023), this research aims to analyze the interaction between scientific discoveries (geosciences and biology) and images production in (science-)fictional field, via the powerful broadcasting media that is cinema, while questioning their technological implementations, their cultural implications and the aesthetic challenge that "the representation of the unreachable" constitutes (Bec & Flusser, 2015). In this perspective, the corpus studied is open to various media : documentaries and fictions, "amateur" and scientific sources, coupled to an embedded ethnography of underwater sciences in the making.
Sergio Marchetti (Università degli studi di Bergamo)
Paper short abstract:
The paper explores an anthropological journey describing 'the fall of the sea from the sky': from the planetary sea to the personal sea in navigation. In this way, an ethnographic itinerary on the maritime multi-dimension is outlined: planetary and terrestrial, experienced at sea, but also from land
Paper long abstract:
Drawing on my personal experiences as an anthropologist and sailor, in this paper I propose a reflection on the dimensions of maritime space through an anthropological literary journey describing 'the fall of the sea from the sky'. By scaling down the supra-terrestrial proportions of the sea investigated by the wet ontologies (Steinberg, Peters 2019) to the personal ones experienced on a boat, I shift the focus from the maritime planetary aspects to the material and experiential ones (Morton, 2018) of sailing. I thus introduce a reflection on the phenomenology of navigation (Phelan 2007) and the interspecific relationships (Helmreich 2010, Sahlins 2018, Haraway 2020) that bind us to the non-human equoreal world during navigation and boat maintenance work. The dimension of nautical refitting sheds light on the relationships that connect boats to land. Therefore, by referencing the ethnography I conduct within a company that produces luxury interiors for Mega and Giga Yachts, I seek to demonstrate how the economy of the sea is linked to mainland production regimes and discuss the radicality of recent perspectives that look the sea from the sea. In this way, an ethnographic itinerary on the maritime multi-dimension is outlined: planetary and terrestrial, experienced at sea, but also from land.
Raffaele Maddaluno (University of Rome La Sapienza)
Paper short abstract:
In this paper I aim to reflect on the implications of adopting an oceanic orientation to explore the transformations at play in the Comoro archipelago. The oceanic movement allows us to reflect on the needs for a “dis-placed” ethnography as a manner for thinking anthropology otherwise.
Paper long abstract:
Based on ethnographic research conducted in the Comoros islands, in this paper I aim to reflect on the implications of trying to adopt an oceanic orientation as a key to understanding the transformative processes at play in the archipelago. In an attempt to understand the impact of blue economy policies, embracing a sea-based perspective allowed me to decentralise the gaze from the resurgence of continental approaches, blurring inter-island identity boundaries and enhancing archipelagic continuities and connections. The engagement with local fishermen has projected me beyond the static imaginaries linked to the myth of progress emphasised by conservationist policies themselves. Going beyond inshore discourses, the daily experience at sea unfolds a world of silences, gestures, knowledge, and techniques that recall temporalities and ecologies, submerged by land-based discourses. Such a maritime rhythm marked the ethnography: unveiling a world of practices in constant counterpoint to the onshore narratives; tracing routes of connections and correspondences which allowed me to navigate between islands and explore in an archipelagic manner the economic and social transformations linked to conservation policies. Opening to the unpredictability, disorientation, and movement triggered by such oceanic immersion becomes an essential element in understanding and appreciating the displacing dimension of ethnography. The sense of disorientation perceived in the oceanic movement allows us to reflect on the needs for a “dis-placed” ethnography as a manner for thinking anthropology otherwise.