Negotiating nature's weather worlds in the context of life with sight impairment

Abstract

We have seen longstanding research interest in diverse nature–society relations, including contentious debates regarding what nature is, the role of humans within or apart from it, and how varied types of non‐human nature shape different societies and individuals within society. Within this work, relatively little attention has been paid to an important aspect of nature experienced everyday: people's “weather‐worlds.” These encompass the qualities of sensory experience that are shaped by fluxes in the medium – the air – in which we routinely live and breathe. Such currents, forces and pressure gradients underwrite our capacities to act and interact with both the animate and inanimate materials and beings we encounter as we negotiate our everyday lives. We focus on these weather worlds here, drawing on the findings of an in‐depth qualitative study exploring how people with varying forms and severities of sight impairment describe their nature experiences, with the weather emerging as an immediate and often highly visceral form of everyday nature encounter among all participants. We reflect on the ephemeral qualities of people's weather‐worlds, highlighting their potential to comfort, invigorate and connect, but also to disorientate, threaten and isolate, at times supporting moments of well‐being or exacerbating experiences of impairment and disability. In doing so, we highlight how attending to the weather is essential if we are to fully understand people's emplaced experiences of well‐being, impairment and disability with(in) diverse forms of multi‐elemental, assembled nature.

Sensing Water: Uncovering Health and Well-Being in the Sea and Surf

“…As Smith (2019) points out, methodological approaches where researchers are both observer and participant are not without issues. However, they allowed for sensitivity and valuable insights into how participants sense place, especially haptic elements (Bell et al., 2018; Bell, Leyshon, & Phoenix, 2019; Smith, 2019), as well as helping to build rapport and a temporal understanding of place effects.…”

“…Preference for place was influenced by these more-than-human relationships, especially so in the decision-making and choice of blue space encounter for surfers and swimmers (Bell et al., 2018). Despite this, there has been a surprising lack of inclusion of natural ephemera, weather conditions, or elemental states in blue space studies (Bell, Leyshon, & Phoenix, 2019b; Britton, Kindermann, et al., 2018; lisahunter, 2018). This is just one example, a background hum if you like, of the immersive thinking that shaped our work.…”

“…For some, moving beyond their comfort zone and overcoming fears boosted confidence for the rest of the day, as one novice male swimmer commented, “you get to know and feel yourself differently.” This feeling was echoed by a more experienced female swimmer, “You can face the day, whatever is going to be thrown at you, after a swim.” This was often further bolstered by a sense of social support, shared experience, and connection to the more-than-human, for example, having someone to swim with or the feeling of “being in a pod of dolphins” (novice swimmer, female, 2017). Bell, Leyshon, and Phoenix (2019, p. 5) refer to this as a “weather imprint” or feel-good factor after immersion.…”

“Disciplined research in undisciplined settings”: Critical explorations of in situ and mobile methodologies in geographies of health and wellbeing

“…With growing interest in health, place, and wellbeing as situated, emergent, and relational, research conducted in and beyond the geographies of health and wellbeing is increasingly looking to in situ and mobile methods that offer complementary insights into the diverse temporalities and spatialities of health, wellbeing, illness, and impairment (Andrews & Duff, 2019;Bell et al, 2019;Gorman, 2019;Hall & Wilton, 2017). As ever, "so what" questions rebound on such methodologies: What do they add to established narrative descriptions of health and wellbeing?…”

“…3 | ATTENDING TO MORE-THAN-HUMAN QUALITIES OF ENCOUNTER Reflecting the broader relational turn occurring within and beyond human geography, there has been a shift within the geographies of health and wellbeing from conceptualising health and illness as properties or "characteristics of specific human bodies or populations" (Andrews & Duff, 2019, p. 125), instead recognising health, wellbeing, illness, and disability as dynamic, emergent expressions of specific more-than-human relational configurations (Bell et al, 2019;Hall & Wilton, 2017). In seeking to place myriad non-human, non-organic entities alongside humans in the co-constitution of health and wellbeing, researchers are increasingly looking to methods that help to understand what is happening in situ, what arrives or leaves to contribute to health and wellbeing, and in what ways (Andrews & Duff, 2019).…”