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Paper short abstract

This paper presents a multispecies visual ethnography of a British Columbia park affected by drought. As drought is often experienced as absence, I seek to render it perceptible as an embodied, multispecies phenomenon by attending to shared sensoriality.

Paper long abstract

This paper presents a multispecies visual ethnography of a British Columbia park affected by drought. I will use the case study of Woodhaven Park to make a methodological proposal on how drought can be made perceptible through an attention to the senses. Located on the unceded territory of the Syilx Okanagan Nation, Woodhaven Park was historically part of low-elevation wetlands and riparian forest shaped by seasonal water flows. Settler drainage, urban expansion, and agricultural development redirected groundwater and desiccated these wetlands, transforming the site into suburban parkland. Drought is most often experienced as absence, and its effects - on the park’s multispecies inhabitants, on the Syilx community whose ontology centres on water, and on the park’s human neighbours - can be difficult to perceive and represent. In response, the paper firstly argues that audio-visual ethnography can render drought perceptible as an embodied phenomenon, paying attention to heat, dryness, bodily fatigue, and altered soundscapes. Secondly, I propose that a sensory ethnographic approach opens a methodological pathway toward multispecies representation by attending to shared corporeality and environmental conditions across human and more-than-human lives, as illustrated through a short audio-visual excerpt.

Audio-visual excerpt: from min. 0 - 1:30

https://vimeo.com/1114348234/0c55971d17?share=copy&fl=sv&fe=ci