The submarine world of abalone
Date
2020
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Abstract
Working interstitially, or what Haraway (2017) would call “tentacularly”, I will trace the
lives of abalone in the sea as well the lives they have on land in farms, and the worlds their
flesh animate when dried or frozen. In lieu of abalone narratives, I will look at the ways in
which abalone come to be in law, government projects, the eyes of poachers, and marine
biologists. To understand the underwater world of those engaged in abalone, Kimon de Greef
and Shuhood Abader’s Poacher: Confessions from the abalone underworld is particularly
generative. This submarine world, or in de Greef and Abader’s (2018) words: “underworld”,
allows us to see the relations that are formed through the poaching, production, and
consumption of abalone, highlighting what Anna Tsing (2005) would call, “the friction of
global capital”, its messiness and the connections created through it. I also look to the ways
government abalone aquafarming websites commodify abalone and water through their
representations of the seas. Finally, I look at the abalone-mandrax assemblage facilitated by
interactions with Chinese Triads as explored in Morris’ documentary The Story of the South
African Quaalude. By engaging in these readings I hope to engage in environmental
questions, such as: Would interspecies justice mean taking into consideration abalone
lifestyle, while recognizing that poachers are victims of an apartheid past they are trying to
redress? How do we synthesize these two positions, when the ocean operates on its own time
scale? The answers are unclear, but the worlds these sea molluscs have slid into makes
thinking of a solution more complex.
Description
A research report submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts to the Faculty of Humanities, University of the Witwatersrand, 2020
Keywords
Lives of abalone, Submarine world, Underwater world