Geopolitics and ‘the vision thing’: regarding Britain and America's first nuclear missile

Abstract

Critical geopolitics, despite its radical ambitions, has been reluctant to shift its emphasis from the figure of the geopolitical tactician, 'decisive' events and the agency of the military-state. This paper, in common with recent work on 'popular geopolitics', offers a different agenda. It takes up the story of Britain and America's first nuclear missile -the US-made 'Corporal' -through the testimony of a self-described 'spacedaft' schoolboy who, in 1959, travelled alone across Scotland to witness the first British testing of the missile. However, unlike much of the literature on popular geopolitics, this paper is concerned with the more-than-representational question of observant practice. Addressing recent calls for a more empirical enquiry into the relationship between geography and visual culture, the paper examines how geopolitical power operates through sights and spectacles. key words Hebrides geopolitics visual culture observant practice Corporal missile Cold War

New directions in critical geopolitics: an introduction

“…This led Feminist geographers to ask, ''Where, as an intellectual and political project, can critical geopolitics go from here?'' (Dowler and Sharp 2001), and has seen emerging research in feminist geopolitics (Secor 2001;Hyndman 2001Hyndman , 2004Gilmartin andKofman 2004), anti-geopolitics (Ó Tuathail 1996b;Routledge 1996Routledge , 2002, the geopolitical dimensions of affect (Anderson 2006;Carter and McCormack 2006;Macdonald 2006;Ó Tuathail 2003), 'neoliberal geopolitics' (Roberts et al 2003; and see also Coleman 2005;Sparke 2006), as well as proposals for a 'post-foundational ethics' (Sparke 2005) all present exciting possibilities and ongoing trajectories.…”

Cultural geography: worldly shapes, differently arranged

“…Within the context of this report, these might be regarded conveniently and cumulatively as a 'testing ground' for ideas. The affective 'event of vision' (Wylie, 2005a: 36) and geopolitical conditions for making a credible claim to having borne witness play a significant part in MacDonald's (2006) critical inquiry into the (im)practicalities of early nuclear missile testing. Holloway's (2003) work with New Age spiritual seekers demonstrates how commonly placed examples of sanctification are not so much a suspension of disbelief, and rather a refiguring of one's moral compass whereby sacred pasts re-enchant the profane in the present.…”

The Commonplace Geopolitics of Conspiracy

“…Whilst a representation focus on texts and images persists to an extent in these accounts, the events of 9/11 and its aftermath also drew into sharp focus the intertwining of grand geopolitical discourse and ‘the quotidian geographies of the home, the street, the combat zone or the prison camp’ (Jones and Sage 2010: 316; and see Gregory 2006; Hannah 2008; Minca 2005, 2006). As such, Power and Campbell (2010) note how “calls for a more sensitive inquiry into the workings of geopower by attending to objects, the human body and matters of percept, affect and emotion, as well as the most ordinary (‘precognitive’) forms of sociality” (p243) have been taken up by Anderson (2010, 2011)Carter and McCormack (2006), Macdonald (2006), Ó Tuathail (2003) and Sidaway (2009), amongst others. Critical geopolitics scholars have also critically demonstrated how the biopolitical regulation of corporeal bodies by the State has become a central element of contemporary securitization in the post‐9/11 world (e.g.…”

“…These emerging lines of inquiry require a re‐examination of critical geopolitics’ objects of analysis, towards the everyday lives of people, to recognise how geopolitical knowledges are also constituted through, “ordinary and less‐ordinary events, biographies, practices and encounters” (Macdonald 2006: 68; see also Müller 2008). Such a sensibility is evident, for example, in Nick Megoran’s ethnographic account of the Ferghana Valley (Uzbekistan‐Kyrgyzstan) border closures (2004, 2006).…”