In A Postcapitalist Politics (2006), J.K. Gibson-Graham deploy an image of a floating iceberg to illustrate what we commonly understand by “the economy.” In their reading of the diverse economy framework, the proverbial tip of the iceberg economy is comprised of “wage labor, market exchange of commodities, and capitalist enterprise” (2006: 70). By contrast, its submerged body can include a multiplicity of sites and actors such as producer cooperatives, bartering practices, and gifts. On the northernmost tip of Newfoundland, in the once-thriving fishing port of St. Anthony, icebergs are being harvested for bottling and sale in the global premium water market. At international trade fairs from Dubai to Shanghai, iceberg water is marketed as the purest water on the planet and a resource originating from a time before the dire effects of pollution and mass industrialization. This article traces the various encounters between icebergs and human actors in the geographical region known as “Iceberg Alley,” in order to assess the social, cultural, economic, and political stakes of these “new” natural resources. The article asks, “If Newfoundland’s Iceberg Alley is ‘the economy,’ what lies below its surface?”
Background: Through a close reading of the four issues of The Bowater Papers, this article aims to understand the rise of a paper modernity and to reinsert it—as material and infrastructure—into media studies.
Analysis: Producing wood paper is a strain on the landscape and the environment. The Bowater Papers showcases the histories and material possibilities of paper media products. A paper-dependent modernity can be understood as an infrastructural assemblage of harvesting, production, circulation, and consumption.
Conclusion and implications: Paper calls for a natural history and geography of media. Thinking about the mediations from tree to paper through the encompassing notion of “xylomedia” is a way of articulating the intersection of the material, environmental, and infrastructural in media studies. Today is still a paper world, one that is also the age of lignin, package, and Amazon.
Contexte : Par une lecture attentive des quatre numéros de The Bowater Papers, nous cherchons à comprendre l’essor de la forme moderne du papier. Se faisant, nous le réinsèrerons—en tant que matériau et infrastructure—dans le champ des études médiatiques.
Analyse : La production de papier de bois est lourde de conséquences pour l’environnement. The Bowater Papers nous renseigne sur des aspects historiques et matériels du papier. La modernité, dépendante du papier, peut ainsi être appréhendée comme un assemblage infrastructurel liant récolte, production, circulation et consommation.
Conclusion et implications : Le papier appelle une histoire et une géographie naturelles des médias. Penser aux médiations de l’arbre au papier avec le concept de « xylomedia » est une façon d’articuler l’intersection du matériel, de l’environnement et de l’infrastructure dans l’étude des médias. Nous vivons toujours dans un âge du papier, un âge qui est aussi celui de la lignine, des paquets, et d’Amazon.
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