"The Oceanic Void" | Gastón Gordillo
In this short excerpt from an upcoming book, Gastón Gordillo proposes that we think the limitless becoming of the ocean as void, an impenetrable and opaque depth that is material but ungrounded. Against modernist views of the ocean as a fluid space of nature to be tamed by human culture, Gordillo begins to trace the operation of the ocean as one kind of terrain among others, like grass, mountains, bridges, buildings, and so on.
"The ocean is certainly the largest expression of liquid space on Earth. Comprising over two-thirds of the surface of the planet, the oceanic void has been one of the most powerful and determining spatial forces in human history. Its most defining feature is that, for the human body, it creates the generalized ungrounding we call drowning. The history of imperial and capitalist expansion into the totality of the planet has revolved, to a great extent, around technological efforts to counter this ungrounding created by the eternal, ever-mobile becoming of liquid space."
An interesting exchange proceeds in the comments section, wherein Philip Steinberg suggests that this term 'void' is too wedded to a sense of emptiness or indeterminacy that may ideological obscure important and socially-relevant material processes occurring within oceanic space. Gordillo clarifies that his preference for this concept of 'void' draws from its usage by Badiou, who stresses the multiple and pluralising character of the void in set theory.
Anyway, both Gordillo's and Steinberg's ongoing projects regarding the ocean look awesome for reading on next year's topic.