Slow violence and toxic geographies: ‘Out of sight’ to whom?

Abstract

Toxic pollution is a form of violence. This article explores the gradual brutalities that communities surrounded by petrochemical infrastructure endure over time. Contributing to political geographies of violence and environmental justice, this paper puts the concept of 'slow violence' into critical comparison with work on 'structural violence'. In doing so, the paper makes two key contributions: First, it emphasizes the intimate connections between structural and slow forms of harm, arguing that structural inequality can mutate into noxious instances of slow violence. Second, the paper pushes back against framings of toxic landscapes as entirely invisible to the people they impact. Instead of accepting the standard definition of slow violence as 'out of sight', we have to instead ask the question: 'out of sight to whom?' In asking this question, and taking seriously the knowledge claims of communities who inhabit toxic spaces, we can begin to unravel the political structures that sustain the uneven geographies of pollution. Based on long-term ethnographic research in a postcolonial region of Louisiana, nicknamed 'Cancer Alley', this paper reveals how people gradually 'witness' the impacts of slow violence in their everyday lives. Finally, drawing on the notion of 'epistemic violence', the paper suggests that slow violence does not persist due to a lack of arresting stories about pollution, but because these stories do not count, thus rendering certain populations and geographies vulnerable to sacrifice.

Ethnographies of Slow Violence: Studying the Effects of Rural Disintegration

“…: Farmer, 2004;Gupta, 2012;Holmes, 2013). Географы и антропологи показывают, как сочетание концепции медленного насилия с этнографическими методами позволяет по-новому и критически взглянуть на ряд тематик, таких как вытеснение и травма в городах (Kern, 2016;Pain, 2019), скрытый расизм в интимных отношениях (Leeuw, 2016), экологический расизм и токсичные географии (Ahmann, 2018; Davies, 2018Davies, , 2019, последствия войн (Touhouliotis, 2018) и насильственный отъем земли (Holterman, 2014). Подобное сочетание эмпирически подтверждает, что медленное насилие стало неотъемлемой частью жизни во многих регионах мира, что оно связано с разными условиями, районами и процессами и что его последствия неравномерно распределены по социальным позициям и территориям.…”

“…Я исхожу из предположения, что медленное насилие не является абсолютно очевидным для тех, кто сталкивается с ним как исследователь, и может быть столь же «невидимым» для тех, кто в него непосредственно вовлечен. Это утверждение содержит в себе некоторое противоречие: согласно Т. Дэвису (Davies, 2019), важно задаваться вопросом,…”

Toxic sights: The spectacle of hazardous waste removal

“…It concerns the stuff of representation, in particular, how visual representations shape the materialities and material politics of removal. Toxic spaces are broadly conceptualised as being 'out of sight' (Davies, 2019). But out of sight to whom?…”

West Virginia waterscapes: Surface and mineral owners’ perspectives on groundwater contamination due to natural gas extraction

“…Similarly, changing landscapes have been characterized as producing "solastalgia", or homesickness when surroundings change (Albrecht et al 2007). Davies (2019) discusses the "stationary Multiple temporalities and outcomes of water contamination around natural gas extraction produce uncertainty about current or future consequences. Especially in this thesis, which presents a case study located in the Global North, anxieties and worries are produced around health and future outcomes, as well as a sense of worry because this environmental reality fails to conform to cultural expectations (Jepson, 2014).…”

“…While Gullion (2015) uses the term "epistemic privilege" borrowed from sociology scholarship, her usage of the term is congruent with the concept of "epistemic authority" from feminist theory and geography scholarship. Further, Davies (2019) Residents working with researchers is one example of counter-expertise formed around groundwater testing. Public counter-expertise is being formed particularly around pipeline controversies in the US (Bosworth 2018).…”