Visualizing the Blue Archive

• In Event: Mediated Seas, Elemental Oceans

Abstract

Dark, deep, and sparsely explored, progressive attempts to mediate the watery world of the seafloor have cast it as a space of technological, scientific, economic, and political possibility. Today, the ability to translate underwater landscapes at depth into video is once more redefining what it means to see and know the seafloor. From 3D modeling and real-time color video, to Instagram feeds and Youtube channels, aspirations for the accessibility and transparency of mediated encounter with the seafloor have proliferated new cultures of material and imaginary intimacy with the deep ocean. In this paper, I examine the production of video archives of sunken artifacts in the deep sea within the field of nautical archaeology. More than merely memorializing lost shipwrecks, new capabilities to model and map shipwrecks have reconstituted the seafloor as a productive repository of history, or as Woods Hole archaeologist Brendan Foley called it, “the biggest museum gallery in the world.” Drawing on a science studies as well as critical media studies approach, I interrogate the discipline of nautical archaeology itself and its role in extending national imaginaries and participating in geopolitical contestations over ocean resources. Specifically, I analyze professional discourse around underwater media technologies and conduct close readings of archaeological videos and texts. Ultimately, I demonstrate that as shipwreck excavation has become an increasingly virtual experience, new visions of what it means to archive the seafloor and to see the seafloor as an archive of both human and natural histories have emerged.

Author

• Lisa Han, UC Santa Barbara