Companions,zappers, and invaders: The animal geopolitics of Sealab I,II, and III (1964–1969) |
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| Institution: | 1. Department of Global & Sociocultural Studies, Florida International University, USA;2. Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Norway;3. University of Florence, Italy;4. University of Reading, UK;5. University of South Carolina, USA;6. Helmholtz Institute for Functional Marine Biodiversity, University of Oldenburg, Germany;7. University of St. Andrews, UK |
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| Abstract: | Between 1964 and 1969, the US Navy undertook a series of experimental projects designed to enable ‘man’ to live and work on the seafloor, in undersea habitats, for prolonged periods of time without surfacing. These little studied projects, known as Sealab I, II, and III, were framed as an ‘attack’ on the hostile space of the sea by the warrior like figure of the American ‘aquanaut’. Drawing on feminist geopolitical scholarship, this paper seeks to decentre the human protagonists of Sealab by foregrounding the role of non-human animal life in the projects. In doing so, it argues that animals actively shaped how the undersea environment came to be understood and inhabited by the US military and calls for greater attention to be paid to the agency of animals – their lives and fleshy affordances - in the construct of territory, and to the ways in which non-human life can complicate the ideas associated with the frontier, gender, and the exertion of colonial power. |
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| Keywords: | Animal Volume Sea Cold war Territory Feminist geopolitics |
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