The WSU Humanities Center invites faculty, students, staff, and the community to a Brown Bag presentation given by Patrick Owuor (Assistant Professor, Anthropology and Public Health ) on the topic of, "Hydrocolonialism: A New Framework for Understanding Water Insecurity and Environmental Injustices".

Abstract: 

Water is at the forefront of climate change, and competition for water resources increases in regions where water is already scarce. In Africa, capital-intensive large-scale water infrastructure projects displace residents and their water heritage to favor planned cities, industrial agriculture, and hydroelectric power stations for energy exports. Funded mainly by concessional loans from wealthy countries, these modern infrastructures repeat past colonial legacies and patterns of extraction, stretching from Ancient Egypt to Manifest Destiny. Such projects, combined with more unpredictable weather due to climate change, often threaten water heritage and significantly heighten water insecurity for humans and aquatic life.

Over the past two years, I have been working with others on a new theoretical framework called Hydrcolonialism to explore the impacts and injustices related to water projects and activities. This project introduces the idea of hydrocolonialism as a new way to understand the relationship between water, the environment, and colonial power. It aims to a) create a multidisciplinary link that connects academic and non-academic fields, including anthropology, literature, data science, and art and media, to study the influence of global capital on water resources, and b) establish a platform that fosters both horizontal and diagonal communication, thereby promoting community participation and ownership in environmental initiatives.

Hydrocolonialism has the potential to address colonial interventions in water and the political control of water. In this talk, I will outline the methodological steps and discuss potential challenges and future directions.