The comfort of the river: understanding the affective geographies of angling waterscapes in young people’s coping practices

Abstract

This paper draws on ethnographic research with angling intervention programs working with 'disaffected' young people in the UK to demonstrate how young people use the affective geographies of waterscapes to regulate their feelings and escape stressful lives.But rather than interpret the restorative or therapeutic quality of waterscapes as the consequence of (passive) immersion into green/blue spaces, we argue that 'comfort' is derived from an ongoing, active engagement with(in) the world. Drawing on works influenced by phenomenological theories and relational understandings of the morethan-human world, we illustrate how the affectual qualities of waterscapes are continually 'woven' into being through the material and embodied practices of young anglers. However, understanding why waterscapes 'matter' to young people also requires accounting for those assemblages originating in the past that shape these coexperienced worlds.

Children and young people living through the monsoon: watery entanglements and fluid inequalities

“…Watery geographies are increasingly on the academic agenda (Gibbs 2014;Clark et al 2017;Djohari, Brown and Stolk 2017); the scale and scope of watery relations extend from the oceans, to microbes, to bodies, industries and much more. Our human bodies are enveloped by watery substances, from the water that we drink, that passes through our bodies, to the puddles that we run through, the rain and dew that falls on our skin and the clouds that we monitor.…”

“…In developing our theorisation of entanglement we are considering the material properties of water to act as a thing (Sultana 2013) building on the work of more-than-human relations (Whatmore 2002), actants (Latour 2005) and new materialisms (Barad 2007;Bennett 2010). Water is entangled in the social and natural world, being at once culture and nature (Oestigaard 2014;Djohari, Brown, and Stolk 2017); indeed, Edgeworth (2014, 157) encourages us to dip our fingers into a flowing river or submerge our bodies in the swell of the ocean, to feel and experience 'these cosmic and planetary forces at work.' Barad (2007) would argue that this is 'diffraction,' a process by which 'agents change each other' (Anggard 2016, 88).…”

“…In this research, they engage with 'water's creative, fluid, dangerous, precarious hydro-logics ' (2016, 110) to offer a new way of thinking through watery relations in the classroom. Recent work on waterscapes has also addressed the affectual geographies of angling (Djohari, Brown, and Stolk 2017), arguing that it is the process and practice of angling within the river environment that provides comfort and solace for young people. Tapsell et al (2001, 185) also acknowledge the importance of rivers in childhood, suggesting that they have a 'special affordance … like coasts, rivers can be viewed as liminal zones … riverbanks, like the seashore, provide a boundary, a physical threshold between land and water.'…”

Young people's outdoor refuges: movements and (dis)entanglements

“…Thus, spaces are in a state of `on-goingness´-continuously becoming and being transformed through moving and interacting bodies (Horton and Kraftl 2006). These assumption allows for a more dynamic view of our research subject, where the respite, comfort or pause of refuges is seen as emerging from on-going embodied practices and interactions with the world, rather than being delivered and received more passively from given environments (Djohari, Brown, and Stolk 2017).…”

“…Natural settings are not inherently therapeutic and restorative, however, as the broader context associated plays an influential role (Milligan and Bingley 2007;Ward Thompson, Aspinall, and Montarzino 2008). Indeed, the `comfort´ of certain natural environments seem to emerge from people's on-going relations with the world, which call attention to the embodied practices of children´s affective geographies (Djohari, Brown, and Stolk 2017). While some previous studies have sought to prove and quantify the benefits of being in outdoor and natural environments, this paper develops critical insights into the practices and interactions that provide for such outcomes.…”