Down to Earth

Abstract

Nature" and "social life" tended to be separated by Enlightenment thinkers, setting the stage for a long-standing tension between geology and social-cultural theory. Such a division suppressed the liveliness that humans have often attributed to material things. Several scholars and artists, many of whom would advocate new materialisms, have attempted to recapture this liveliness. Drawing upon these developments, we use the notion of "geosocialities" (the commingling of the geologic and the social and the sensibilities involved) to facilitate appreciation of the mineral and the alignment between geology and social-cultural theory. While geosocialities overlap with nature-cultures and "biosocialities," they are "harder" in the sense of drawing attention to geology and its relation to social life. Such a move seems timely, keeping in mind the popular claim that in the Anthropocene, humans have become a geologic force. At the same time, it opens up a down-to-earth form of geopolitics that exceeds classic notions of the term, attending to different geologic scales; to living bodies, human and nonhuman; to solid rock; and to the planet. We develop our argument through engagement with two sites. One concerns the inscription of human activities in volcanic rock, the second the embodiment of isotopes in living beings. These examples raise questions about the multiple scales of geosociality, which intertwine biography and Earth "itself."

Looking down, staying with and moving along: Towards collaborative ways of knowing with nature in the Anthropocene

“…The Anthropocene brings forth that geologies are part of our daily lives, we are entangled in various relations to nature and the earth in very basic terms. In order to describe this entanglement Pálsson and Swanson (2016) propose the concept of geosociality, which, they argue, opens up for ways to include rocks, stones or just minerals in general in the definition of the social. They argue that it is crucial to explore the multiple layers of relations that braid "biographies and earth systems" (p. 167).…”

“…Without denouncing the importance of thinking big, it is important to pay attention to other scales or layers as well. As Pálsson and Swanson (2016) remark, the universalism, the Anthropocene implies, has the risk of masking off any difference and sustaining a distinction between global earth systems and local human differences and activities. We need, in other words, to situate the globality of the Anthropocene.…”

Sublime encounters: Commodifying the experience of the geos

“…This paper develops these arguments and integrates them with emerging ideas from the literature on the geosocial, and the significance of the earth in understanding the humanand vice versa (Palsson & Swanson, 2016). It also seeks to demonstrate the geo-economics that is inherent in volcano tourismparticularly where erupting volcanoes are concerned, and where risk has to be managed alongside a drive for economic gain from affective, sublime encounters.…”

“…These recollections and images are highly emotive and all have impacted upon human culture in the intervening centuries. The affective character of volcanoes has been exploited by Hollywood and through other creative media, and the recent burgeoning of volcanic "geoparks" and "geotourism sites" is additional evidence that human imagination is closely bound up with the forces of the earth and its potential for destruction: many such sites incorporate processes of memorialisationfrom Pompeii to more recent efforts to reframe Montserrat and Heimaey in Iceland as sites of tourism (Erfurt-Cooper, 2011;Palsson & Swanson, 2016;Skinner, 2018).…”

How to Represent a Fish?

“…They are rich in omega-3 and they also provided for Peru's material wealth at different historical moments. 57 Mackerel has a content of 2.6 per 3.5 ounces while sole only has 0.1. 58 This is to say that the psychotropic qualities of sole are poor, even if it is now an expensive fish.…”