Caroline Austin


Ocean Memory: Early Modern Pasts and Uncertain Futures

This interdisciplinary collaborative project included Early Modern scholar Dr Louise Noble, University of New England and composer Dr Paul Ballam-Cross, University of Queensland. The project, presented to the University of California Oecologies Network, investigated how historical and current relationships with ocean currents might help us, at a time of extreme ecological precarity, to reorient our perceptions about ecological pasts, presents, and futures.

The project focused on the history of human relationships with the complex system of ocean currents and prevailing weather systems that move between the Indonesian Archipelago and Australia. It looked at currents as agents of memory, repositories of knowledge, keepers of secrets, and conveyors of wisdom, using literature, sound, and video.

Further information on the project is available at: https://surrenderabovebelow.cargo.