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Volatile waters and the hydrosocial anthropocene: a comparative study of life in major river deltas

Subject Area Social and Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology
Human Geography
Term from 2016 to 2023
Project identifier Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 276392588
 
Final Report Year 2024

Final Report Abstract

Volatile Waters studied everyday life in four geographically and ethnographically diverse river deltas, focusing on the intersections of a shifting material landscape with social, economic and cultural transformations. Based on ethnographic studies, the project thereby reversed the more common framework of approaching life in river deltas through remote sensing and large data sets. Project researchers conducted ethnographic fieldwork in the Ayeyarwady Delta (Myanmar), the Mackenzie Delta (Canada), the Parnaíba Delta (Brazil) and the Sine-Saloum Delta (Senegal). The project developed the term "volatility" for socio-material analysis, as a concept emphasizing always uncertain and potentially rapid and profound transformations in delta inhabitants’ lives. The project also devised ways of describing delta life as aspects of a "hydrosocial Anthropocene", grounding the sweeping claims of the Anthropocene discourse in concrete and historically specific relations with water. The project’s main findings include the in-depth analysis of situated practices of inhabiting rapidly transforming landscapes, distilling regionally specific issues and comparing similarities and differences across world regions. The research developed a theoretical foundation for anthropologically approaching volatile delta environments, focusing on movements, rhythms and other dynamics that characterize both material and sociocultural processes in river deltas. It also experimented with methodological tools to ethnographically explore such life, from walks and boating trips to the general handling of ubiquitous uncertainty that shapes not just many aspects of delta life, but also ethnographic research practice. Subsequently, the project worked out ways of writing, filming, exhibiting and otherwise representing the things researchers had learned during fieldwork. It produced academic publications alongside outputs directed at wider audiences, including a museum exhibition, a coffee-table book, and audiovisual material; the production of a comic is currently in progress. All publications emphasize that the climatic, hydrological and economic crises that characterize river deltas as global change hotspots matter to delta inhabitants in relation to longer-established, and often more pressing concerns, including political conditions, colonial legacies, or sociocultural marginalization. What looks like novel crises from above are therefore merely new facets of older challenges when seen from below. However, delta dwellers often show remarkable resilience in the face of what to outside observers appear like insurmountable challenges in the face of global warming, sea level rise, etc. The project documents the noteworthy improvisations through which delta inhabitants have long made ends meet, as well as their attitudes towards what may look like radical transformations to outsiders. Where some people see catastrophe and change, delta inhabitants may see routine and continuity.

Publications

 
 

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