Research about swimming and surfing has tended to focus on sensual experiences of being in water or the health and wellbeing benefits these activities afford. But paddling out into the ocean – or a river or lake or dam – puts us in encounter with all kinds of plants, animals, minerals, chemicals, histories, climates, technologies, and ancestors. Their more-than-human encounters are often framed by swimmers and surfers in terms of wonder or awe but the encounters we have in oceans also come with risks. To swim and surf is to accept ourselves as part of a complex ecology and that collaboration in these environments leaves us vulnerable and lacking in control.
Recent ocean fieldwork has immersed me in risky and challenging aspects of more-than-human research through my encounters with waves, cold temperatures, sharks, debris, jellyfish, and pollution. From stinging tentacles to sharp rocks and branches, to itchy skin and the threat of shark bite, swimming and surfing encounters have many possible sensations and outcomes beyond stoke and awe.
This discussion will explore how doing research in oceans means collaboration with the conditions and critters at home there and requires finding ways to navigate possibility threatening encounters – or to stay on the shore. Thinking about the vulnerability and forms of accretion that experienced through my fieldwork, has helped me understand the potential and limitations of immersive research in water ecologies.