Tag Archives: The Ocean Reader

The Ocean Reader

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The opening paragraph of this reading caught my attention. Because it’s impossible to cut trees or mine the surface of the ocean, it seems “impervious to the onslaught of the harvesters.” I had never before considered terracentrism.

I’m not sure how relevant this is to the reading, but I can somewhat relate on a personal level to the concept of terracentrism. A few years ago, I watched a documentary called Cowspiracy. As a result of that film and Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma, I became a pescetarian. For 2 years, I didn’t even consider the ocean or the beings affected by my consumption of fish. It wasn’t until I learned more about overfishing and the exploitation of dolphin populations in places like Japan that I even considered cutting out fish from my diet. Although I don’t believe it is up to the individual to change the environmental destruction on a large scale, I somewhat disregarded the ocean as a productive ecosystem.

The concept of the Ocean being one interconnected system without boundaries fascinates me. By naming different parts of the ocean as their own ocean, we have artificially separated a singular connected ecosystem into different parts. By doing so, we forget that species like birds and whales travel across these permeable “borders” for their migrating patterns. We also forget that there are countries that are disproportionately affected by the overconsumption of goods in wealthy countries. For example, the trash that the US sends to China and subsequently the Philippines affects the populations of people and animals all over the Pacific. A plastic bottle I throw into the Pacific won’t magically stop at the edge of the next ocean over.

The Ocean Reader: Theory, Culture, Politics

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Eric Paul Roorda’s introduction from “The Ocean Reader: Theory, Culture, Politics” provides further explanation of the idea of boundaries and human’s impact on nature. Roorda explains how while each ocean of the world is different in terms of depth, temperature, etc., they are all interconnected. He says how each of the Seven Seas shares the same currents and H2O molecules, technically meaning there is one large ocean. This brought me back to the idea of boundaries and what they really mean. A boundary marks the limit of an area, meaning the boundaries of each sea are just separating a specific spot of this one big ocean. These boundaries do depend on environmental factors of the seas themselves but have been created by human beings. Humans are the ones who have decided where the seas should be separated and why that decision was made. This relates to the idea that everything on our planet is created by mankind. While people did not decide what nature looks like and how it acts, they have decided where the boundaries of nature exist.

Humans have also decided where the boundaries of how we interact with the ocean are. There has been a long fear of the ocean due to how much of it is undiscovered. As explained in the reading, humans have not yet colonized the ocean. Humans might not live in the water yet but have found ways to live with it. The creation of watersports such as surfing, jet skiing, and paddleboarding allows people to break the boundary between land and the ocean. People are able to use the ocean for entertainment and exercise and live in harmony with the ocean that was so often feared in the past. I am interested to see how the future will change these boundaries with the ocean. Through further exploration and discovery, the ocean could hold an even larger role in human life.

Week 10: The Ocean Reader: Theory, Culture, Politics

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Eric Paul Roorda’s The Ocean Reader: Theory, Culture, Politics was for sure an interesting read. Instead of categorizing the Ocean into the different oceans we know right now (e.g. the Pacific, the Atlantic, the Mediterranean Sea…), Roorda suggests to rather see the ocean as one place (cf. p 1). Moreover, Roorda critiques that we humans “have often seen it as a changeless space, one without history. Because the Ocean can’t be plowed, paved, or shaped in ways the eye is able to discern, it has seemed to be a constant, while the land has changed drastically over the centuries” (p.1). Looking at this statement made me think about the definition of wilderness once again. When wilderness is something the humans have constructed and thus put a certain value to it for their own enjoyment, Roorda’s statement suggests that humans have not put value to the ocean for a long period of time. As it was not socially constructed to be a place with a long period of history, the ocean was so to say ignored to be ”changeable” (p.1). Nevertheless humans have always tried to exploit the ocean and to conquer it through using it as a road or through exploiting it by fishing because humans have just taken it for granted (cf. p.4). Just like in times of imperialism, humans have claimed the ocean to be something for their own purpose without actually understanding how powerful it is. By capitalizing Ocean, a new value is put onto it: “The deviation from conventional style is intended to claim a formal name for that vast place within the realm of World History, as if it were a country or a continent […] To capitalize Ocean is to challenge the conventional wisdom that the seas can be taken for granted. They cannot”. (Taking that in for a bit longer, I really feel like through this class I really start to question every concept existent on this planet. I never wondered why Ocean was not capitalized even though it makes up the biggest area on the Earth?!).

Side Note:

This reading reminded me of Disney’s Moana. The semigod Maui stole Te Fiti’s heart out of a selfish desire for recognition and power so that Te Fiti was no longer able to create life. The Ocean was later filled with darkness and life outside of the water was destructed. I wonder at this point if there is Polynesian folklore that is teaching humans about the exact same thing above??!