The Drowned

Beschreibung

‘A heart-wrenching interrogation of the human and more-than-human consequences of drowning. Whether dealing with the dispossessed and enslaved, witch trials, or planetary water crises, Stratford is empowered by a sense of humanity for those who have gone before and will come after us.’
—Professor Klaus Dodds, Royal Holloway University of London, UK, and author of Border Wars 

‘Offers a compelling account weaving archival stories and textual records, contemporary debates, and personal reflections. It will have impact long after the last page is read.’
—Professor Stuart Elden, University of Warwick, author of The Birth of Territory 

‘An important appeal to recognise the personhood of the drowned and trace how they are entangled in the social world. It invites more, and necessary work to respect and dignify the dead.’
— Dr Carol Farbotko, Griffith University, Australia 

‘Drowning is the primal form of death, geographically localized yet cosmic. This book resonates with that insight. A poignant, expansive, morally engaged cultural geography.’
—Professor Thomas Laqueur, UC Berkeley, author of The Work of the Dead 

‘A meticulously researched book. Stratford develops processes to think elementally and ethically with water and those who die in it and offers rigorous argument, cascading insights, and mature scholarly contemplation of how, where, and why the drowned matter.’
—Professor Elizabeth McMahon, UNSW Sydney, author of Islands, Identity and the Literary Imagination 

This book concerns the elemental geographies and lives and deaths of the drowned to confront enduring forms of oppression. Elaine Stratford documents with penetrating compassion and acumen how human and more-than-human bodies lose personhood in acts of violence, exploitation, marginalisation, cultural imperialism, and powerlessness. This work is both a scholarly and deeply personal call to rethink how we live with, remember, and honour the drowned. It offers profound insights to all those interested in human geography and allied disciplines. 

Elaine Stratford is Professor of Human Geography and Planning at the University of Tasmania, Australia. Her research explores how people flourish and languish in place and on the move.

This book concerns the elemental geographies and lives and deaths of the drowned to confront enduring forms of oppression. Elaine Stratford documents with penetrating compassion and acumen how human and more-than-human bodies lose personhood in acts of violence, exploitation, marginalisation, cultural imperialism, and powerlessness. This work is both a scholarly and deeply personal call to rethink how we live with, remember, and honour the drowned. It offers profound insights to all those interested in human geography and allied disciplines.

Autor*in

Elaine Stratford

Themen in »The Drowned«

drowning drowned biopolitics archives abjection geopolitics geography political geography waterways cultural geography

Stimmen zu »The Drowned«

“The Drowned is not for the faint hearted. It is a powerful and, at times, a heart-wrenching scholarly interrogation of the human and more-than-human consequences of drowning. Presenting a range of case studies from the fate of the dispossessed and enslaved to the witch trials and planetary water crisis, this is a book empowered throughout by an enduring sense of humanity and decency for those who have gone before us and in the future.” (Professor Klaus Dodds, Royal Holloway University of London, UK, and author of “Border Wars”)

“A compelling and fascinating, if often disturbing, account of drownings through history and our recent past. Stratford weaves together discussions of contemporary debates in many disciplines, archival stories and textual records, and personal reflections on the role of the researcher and their material. A powerful and moving read, a major contribution to Geography and beyond, and one which will have an impact long after the last page.” (Professor Stuart Elden, University of Warwick, UK, and author of “The Birth of Territory”)

“Empathetically curious and deeply evocative in its feminist geographic scholarship, The Drowned is an important appeal: to recognize the personhood of the drowned, to understand that the drowned are somewhere, and to trace how they are entangled in the social world. In Stratford’s accounting for and learning from the drowned, we confront several instances of murder by drowning. From death perpetrated on an infant by a lone parent, to organised regimes of exploitation and violence, to a silenced spectre of dead and drowned as climate change looms, this work is an invitation to do ongoing, incomplete, but necessary work to respect and dignify the dead.” (Dr Carol Farbotko, ARC Future Fellow, Griffith University, Australia)

“Drowning is the primal form of death, geographically localized and at the same time cosmic, oblivion at its most basic. For that reason, it is also one that resonates across boundaries from migrant children washed up on the shores of the Mediterranean to witches dunked in ponds to slaves thrown into the sea in order to collect on cargo insurance, to Aboriginals in Australia massacred and thrown in rivers. Stratford has written a poignant, expansive, and morally engaged cultural geography of bodies dead from drowning.” (Thomas Laqueur, Helen Fawcett Distinguished Professor Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley and author of “The Work of the Dead: A Cultural History of Mortal Remains”)

“In this profound and significant book, Elaine Stratford addresses with forensic attention the external, internal, and historical geographies of the fatally drowned. Meticulously and thoroughly researched, it brings together scholarship across disciplines. In it, Stratford develops her own process of thinking elementally and ethically with water and about those whose die in water across a range of geographical, historical, cultural contexts. The Drowned offers the reader rigorous argument, cascading insights, and the great pleasure of mature, scholarly contemplation. We are left in no doubt about how, where, and why the silent absent presence of the drowned really matters.” (Elizabeth McMahon, Professor of English Literature, UNSW, Sydney, and author of “Islands, Identity and the Literary Imagination”)

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