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Special Session 8: Marine public education |
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The social life of the sea: How sociology can contribute to understanding and teaching about ocean life
Tuesday 10th @ 0950-1005
Room 5
Angela Lehmann* , Department of Sociology, University of Xiamen
Presenter Email: lehmann@xmu.edu.cn
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| By drawing on the ¡®human factor¡¯, a sociological perspective on marine studies emphasises the multiple ways that oceans are social spaces. To-date, sociology as a discipline remains landlocked (Lambert et al. 2006). The ocean sciences likewise, tend to dismiss the social nature of the sea. This paper briefly outlines the role of the history of oceans and how they have been considered in pre-modern and modern times. I demonstrate the ways that oceans are connected with the histories, stories, mythologies and cultures of many societies. Oceans are seen at times as ¡®non-space¡¯, as vulnerable, as hostile and as spaces of consumption and production. Further, debates about oceans are underpinned by two fundamental and sometimes competing ideas of social action ¨C competition and cooperation. These different discourses about the social role and function of oceans should be integrated into the decision-making processes or environmental governance. Engaging with the relationship between the ocean and social world is fundamentally important to understanding both ecological behaviour, public understandings of sustainability and maritime and coastal management. All environmental problems are social problems and hence a cooperative, multi-disciplinarity of social and natural scientists working together is needed. Life on the blue planet is, after all, a highly collaborative affair (Picken 2016).
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