Reading the Nordic Seas: Oceanic Literacy in a Wetter World
Navn på bevillingshaver
Karl Emil Rosenbæk Reetz
Titel
Postdoctoral Fellow
Institution
University of Oslo
Beløb
DKK 2,773,528
År
2025
Bevillingstype
Internationalisation Fellowships
Hvad?
Retriving lost knowledges of oceanic interrelations is of crucial importance for initiating more amenable existences in the future. The project 'Reading the Nordic Seas' therefore asks two interconnected questions: How does Nordic ocean fiction describe human-sea relationships? And how can this cultural archive of ‘blue encounters’ inform the current ecological emergency of a wetter world?
Hvorfor?
The project adresses the issue of sea level rise. Being coastal nations, Denmark and Norway has a long tradition of human-sea relationships. Modern Industrialisation, however, pushed the knowledge of respecting the sea in background. The rising seas demand that we, again, develop a nuanced oceanic literacy beyond extraction and mastery and towards co-habitation.
Hvordan?
The project analyses a range of Danish and Norwegian sea fictions spanning the industrial period of the last 200 years. There exists a rich, yet underexplored archive of literary texts that portray a vast range of oceanic knowledges. These can, the project hypothesises, inspire more life-friendly, adaptive, and culturally resonant responses to the watery challenges of the current epoch.