On the necessity of blue humanities KNOWING, THINKING AND WRITING WATER
by Friederike Reents
Even though oceans cover two thirds of earth‘s surface, more than half of the world’s population lives near the coast, and humans are made up of around 60% water, our knowledge about water still is limited. Although there is a great deal of culturally passed-down wisdom, it is often treated separately from scientific knowledge and technical innovations. This gap affects not only the saltwater of the oceans, but also the much smaller quantities of freshwater and drinking water. Due to increasing scarcity and attempts at privatization, water is threatened to become “the ‘oil’ of the 21st century”, as Axel Goodbody predicted in 2008.
The understanding of water has deep roots in ancient and biblical traditions and myths. In addition, water has always inspired the visual arts and literature, which in turn has given the public more knowledge about water. Water is portrayed as a symbol of life, but also of death and danger, transformation, purification, renewal, and, repeatedly, as a force of destiny and nature. The variety of representations of water in art shows that socio-historical classifications into a “cosmological”, a “Christian” and a “scientific” age, fall far too short to grasp this phenomenon.
In order to understand water as comprehensively as possible, (scientific and technical) measuring and testing is not enough. Rather, the ways in which we think and write about water need to be reconsidered. This is the goal of transdisciplinary and transcultural water studies: to create a dialogue between the traditional and the new, to establish connections, and, by crossing borders, to gain new,—one might say, blue—knowledge. This led Steven Mentz to coin the term "blue humanities" for this emerging field.
The initial focus of cultural water studies on the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea was soon criticized as deriving from Western ideas of the sea. As the reference areas were widened, the theoretical approaches also had to be revised and viewed critically in postcolonial terms, for example by comparing Carribean works to European or North-American ones. The Caribbean poet and literary theorist Édouard Glissant, for instance, pointed out that the “other” is not necessarily comprehensible and should be left in this opacity, as otherwise it threatens to be subject to hegemonic attempts at categorization once again.
Beyond the ocean fixation, the "blue humanities" nowadays also understand smaller (inland) seas containing salt water, freshwater resources, ice formations and water vapor under the concept of planetary water; water is thus considered in its various temperature-dependent aggregate states and no longer just in a specific geographical area. Beyond its geographical and material occurrence, the interplay of water and space and water and gender also brings up new discussions. Literary texts, works of art, films, and epistemic practices can reveal new ways of thinking and writing about water. Increasingly, the “terrestrial bias”—the traditional land-based ontologies and classifications of the humanities—is being questioned.
The environmental, and often (eco)activist, impetus of global climate change plays a major role in this shift. The question arises: to what extent can science be politically or even activist-driven? It remains to be seen how literary and cultural theory can make the threats to the “blue planet” comprehensible and contribute meaningfully to protecting water resources for the future. To what extent this also requires a “blue humanity”— for example, a sense of connectedness conveyed by artists— is one of the key areas of inquiry in the Blue Humanities.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Friederike Reents is Full Professor in German Literature at the Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt. Her research interests include literature from the 17th to the 21st century, environmental humanities and cultural sustainability as well as atmospheric aesthetics and the politics of works.
The article “Knowing, Thinking and Writing Water—On the necessity of blue humanities”, summarizes Friederike Reents’ special lecture at CAPAS’ International Symposium “Precarious Water Futures and the End(s) of World(s)—an Integrative Dialogue Across Disciplines and Societies.”