Planetary Waters – Sea Futures
Lecture Series Winter 2023/24
Interdisciplinary Approaches to the Baltic Sea Region
Thursday, 18.15–19.45
University of Greifswald
Domstr. 9a, Lecture Hall 2.05
For online participation please write to: balticsea-events[at]uni-greifswald.de
Oceans are no great outside. Today they are no longer the stage for Captain Ahab to hunt the whale Moby Dick, Robinson Crusoe to get lost on a remote island or for Thomas Morus to imagine his Utopia. Today the Oceans come to us as a collective intelligence that seeks revenge, as the rising tide swallowing islands, cities, and landscapes. They flow into our bodies as our very origin. Our everyday lives participate constantly in a process of planetary aquaforming.
The webs of meaning that connect us with the waters of this world have changed fundamentally. Every instance of CO2 we produce links us via indexical connections to melting glaciers and rising sea levels, the food we eat tells us stories of ocean acidification, every sea creature we enjoy is a sign of overfishing and the destruction of marine life worlds. The clothes on our skin drip with virtual water that travelled the world and was taken from the planetary hydrocommons. Our passports remember how we use the seas as barriers and weapons against other people. Even the driest land dweller cannot escape these entanglements. And literature as well is enmeshed in our common oceanic intimacies.
Organisation:
Antje Kempe
Wibke Müller