ABSTRACT
Why do we include technology as a central category in our explorations of waterworlds? The short answer is that water simply seems to attract and absorb technologies. Every waterworld abounds with ways of directing water from the ground or the sky into pipes, animals, bottles, plants, food, people, or any other kind of vessel or consumer. Water has to be handled in some way by every living community, and throughout history the diversity and the human ingenuity in devising means of handling water have been amazing – and continue to be so. In the Arctic, frozen blocks of freshwater are central to inhabitants in the dry winter season when the snow evaporates. In arid landscapes deep wells are dug, ingenious canals and dams constructed, and on atolls inhabitants live on a porous fresh water lens centimetres below the surface supplemented by quite another important water resource 5 metres up, sheltered by the thick husk of young coconuts. Everywhere water is handled with various technologies that in turn process and form water whether it is sprinkled, warmed, carried, drunk, poured, cleaned or deep-frozen. Humans and non-humans perform the waterworlds with many specialized skills and tools, and new technologies are constantly developed.
