Water has played a central role as a resource and property in our dominant worldviews. It has made and unmade empires. In our nation-building, watercourses, waterways, oceans, rivers and freshwaters have all played leading roles, part of a continued and relentless drive to choreograph and subjugate our waters. But it is the indigenous, the subjugated, and the oppressed who seem to best recognise water’s power as both a life force and a catastrophic threat. For them, water is kin, creator, and protector.

In this episode, we wanted to explore relationality when it comes to water. The politics of kinship can be complicated, but how would we approach our bodies of water if they were kin? So, we asked three women who have made water, and bodies of water, their life work a range of questions. We wanted to see through their eyes how water has shaped them and how they have shaped their relations with water.

In part one of this episode, we will hear descriptions of their work and play as it relates to water, how it has shaped them as people, and why they consider their projects or interventions so important. Our guests are: Sejal Mehta, an author and editor based in Mumbai, India who has a debut non-fiction book on intertidal wildlife called Superpowers on the Shore, published by Penguin Randomhouse in 2022; Divya Panicker an oceanographer whose work focuses on cetacean distributions, habitat use and behaviour off the southwest coast of India and Tasneem Khan, a biologist, photographer, adventurer, and educator who has spent the last decade facilitating interdisciplinary initiatives in the fields of ecology, conservation,education, and science communication.

The Subverse is the podcast of Dark ‘n’ Light, a digital space that chronicles the times we live in and reimagining futures with a focus on science, nature, social justice and culture. Follow us on social media @darknlightzine, or at darknlight.com for episode details and show notes.

Of Relationality and Water: Stories of Kinship, Care and Belonging Part 1