Water, Creativity and Meaning

Liz Roberts is a cultural geographer currently working at the University of West of England, UK, on an RCUK project on digital storytelling and water scarcity (www.dryproject.co.uk). Katherine Phillips is a social researcher at the University of West of England, UK, with interests in sustainable living, human–environment relations and the mainstreaming of radical alternatives.

"Water, Creativity and Meaning makes an insightful contribution to current understandings of human-environmental relationships. Centering on creative practices, it explores the intimate and interconnected engagements with water that people experience and embody at a personal and local level, showing how these generate important memories and meanings; enable the composition of individual and community identities; and encourage deep and affective relations with place." - From the Foreword, Veronica Strang, University of Durham, UK "Beyond the empirical richness of the collection the most striking themes for me that emerge from the essays are a range of conceptual explorations at the leading edge of water research. I was very interested to see emerging interest in different forms of "attunement", attentiveness, and materiality, posing questions in terms of research methodology as well as the interpretation of different kinds of developments that span human and other-than-human realms." – From the Afterword, Matthew Gandy, Professor of Cultural and Historical Geography, University of Cambridge, UK"This volume crosses disciplinary borders to combine history, literature, arts, anthropology, and traditional narratives of water. The result is a powerful critique of methodology and interpretation, offering productive ways of engaging with new ways of doing research on water. The hardcover book is beautifully designed with an evocative cover, and is pleasant to hold in one’s hands, adding a rare sensory component to its reading." - Kuntala Lahiri-Dutt, Water Alternatives

• Foreword by Veronica Strang Introduction Part I: Fluid processes: creative research with water 1. Water Power: Creativity and the Unlocking of Community Knowledge 2. This long river… 3. Sunless Waters of Forgetfulness (a geopoetic assemblage) 4. From Gallura to the Fens: Communities Performing Stories of Water Part II: Becoming water bodies 5. Mapping a Blue Trace: An Intermittent Swimming Life 6. Creative compulsions: performing surfing as art 7. Waves as Emblemata for Knowledge Part III: Water we know? 8. Re-envisioning the Hydro Cycle: The Hydrosocial Spiral as a Participatory Toolbox for Water Education and Management 9. Fluid-Sound 10. And all at once the clouds descend, Shed tears that never seem to end. Looking from the Early Modern Age at Water in the Anthropocene Part IV: When water disrupts: Water as agent and co-constitutor of place and culture 11. ‘Water mafia’ politics and unruly informality in Delhi’s unauthorised colonies 12. Encountering Water: Sensitivities and practices for moving beyond ‘Big Water’ interventions 13. Thinking like Water Moves – Living with Climate Change in Tarawa, Kiribati 14. Narratives that Travel: Anxiety, Affect and Water Politics in the Deschutes Watershed of Central Oregon 15. Conclusion Afterword: Interview with Matthew Gandy