Performing elusive mobilities: ritualization, play, and the drama of scheduled departures
Abstract
Drawing upon three years of ethnographic fieldwork conducted in ferry-dependent islands and remote coastal communities of British Columbia, this paper examines the process of catching a ferry in time for a scheduled sailing. Through performance, interactionist, and non-representational theory I argue that the weaving of a journey toward the ferry terminal can be a suspenseful drama, within which a scheduled departure works as a potential to be actualized through the performance of skillful acts of mobility. The affective, ritualistic, and playful components of passengers' journeys are examined through the lens of performance. Timing, spacing, and acting occasion differential ecologies of affect.
Description
This is a post-print of the original version. The definitive, peer-reviewed and edited version of this article is published in Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 29(2), 353–368. doi:10.1068/d5010Collections
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