ABSTRACT

An historic hubris decided there was no need to answer that persistent inquiry for centuries. A renewed urgency of locality, vulnerability and a new materiality of oceanic anima draw attention to the very sea have overused and cast aside as an epistemological is casualty shortsighted modernity of terra firma. The sea is the underlying assurance with which much of contemporary urbanity has pursued its claims to land use. The many capacities the ocean sustains include the sewage and garbage which accompany fishing, cooking, cleaning, bathing, drinking, washing, irrigating and entertaining. It was a shocking revelation that in a city plagued by incessant flooding, there is no potable water available. People have to buy drinking water. The word coexistence encapsulates the Indian Ocean, the densest sea agglomeration of coexistence across continents, religions and geographies. Coexistence, however, also implies predatory economics, and the Indian Ocean is certainly enmeshed in global commercial and governance implications.