It’s almost ready to begin! Watch this hashtag for some great #coastalhistory #coastalstudies discussion! #fracturedcoasts

The sessions will be recorded, so those of you who can’t attend can listen later.

The sessions were so interesting that I failed to tweet! Highlights coming up!

@E_Devienne on #Fracturedcoasts and tensions she saw in Los Angeles beach history --the fracture btwn the ideal of beach as a democratic space vs the beach divided by class, race, ethnicity, sexuality. 'Jim Crow' beaches of the c20th, then post WW2 move to remove those fractures.

In c21st, new fractures developing, with wealth fracturing beach from land-locked places because of houses on coast blocking access. Sea level rise and public access to beaches will be an interesting facet of current and future debates.

@Gerry_Bigelow talked abou literal fracturing of physical coastlines, dune systems and their effect on human settlements. Excavating Shetland farms lost to sand blows and buried during era of global cooling. Goal to get an understanding of role of climate change and catastrophes.

He also emphasises current dilemma of trying to determine which coasts and cultural resources should be salvaged without privileging different periods or peoples. Scale of loss is huge, from sea level rise, storms, dredging, sand mining, etc. #FracturedCoasts

Another interesting piece of info from Bigelow: Pictish people in Shetland placed cemeteries on shoreline between 200-600CE; they had a different cultural attitude towards permanence than many peoples today.

@brdemuth treated us to #FracturedCoasts of the Bering Strait over the last 200 years. Many kinds of fractures --btwn indigenous groups, btwn Russia and the US; but also species fractures, including the overhunting of walrus at different times by American and Soviet whalers.

Loved Demuth's description of fractures caused by the cyclical seasons of sea ice. This is such an important aspect of the Arctic environment, and shows the rapidity of climate change. The ice doesn't come as far down on the coast in winter as it used to...

Also important point: Demuth brings up methodological questions abt how to deal with a history that is cyclical vs the traditional linear narratives. How do we navigate between those forms of writing? @david_gange has also discussed this in his work. #CoastalHistory

@DavidGange discussed how #CoastalHistory has changed his way of thinking about history. It is a way to rethink traditional, urban-centred narratives, e.g. colonialism, the Enlightenment, to see deliberate efforts to fracture coastal life by discrediting subsistence activities.

Gange is influenced by Azoulay's Potential History and what that approach can tell us about the coasts and their traditions. He also mentions important work by Caribbean thinkers such as Edouard Glissant which are useful to decolonise the coastal history of the Atlantic edge.

Gange- Sees possibilities of coastal history and fracture in a positive sense --the coasts as connectors, such as in the work of Barry Cunliffe. It's a different way to situate history and to see continuities. Gange showed this in his wonderful book Frayed Atlantic Edge.

@WorthingtonD asked panel how they all came to studying the coasts. Most started out studying land-focused topics, but developed interest from research opportunities.

DeMuth pointed out how public interest in coasts is growing because of sea level rise. In 20 yrs, parts of Arctic will no longer be terrestrial. I'm also thinking about the permafrost melting there as well. Arctic coast is seeing huge changes quickly.

Excellent Q&A reminded me of reading I need to do! Some books mentioned include Lipman's Salt Water Frontier, David Lloyd, Irish Times: the Temporalities of Modernity; Ariella Azoulay, Potential History. The Coastal History Network has a great Zotero library now as well.

Re: cyclical vs linear time when writing about coasts. Good sources are Lloyd (above tweet). Demuth adds that novelists do it well in a formal sense; indigenous story-telling is cyclical but also shows change over time; writing of ecologists also grapples with cyclical processes.

Indigenous ways of knowing about coasts are so important. Need to dig out my own volumes of indigenous histories, particularly Dena'ina stories about the coast of south-central Alaska. Importance of reading widely really came out in this Roundtable. Thanks everyone!