On Disquieting Ground
Erosion and Narration on Samothraki Island, Greece
Abstract
This article focuses on attempts by inhabitants of the island of Samothraki, in North-Eastern Greece, to make sense of rapid soil erosion and degradation. Through the use of ethnographic vignettes, collected during my first fieldwork on the island in August of 2022, and broader ethnographic material, I show the imbrication of landscape perception with questions of collective ethics as well as the specific forms of social uncertainty which emerge from soil instability. The article highlights specific and local discursive attempts to make sense of broader processes, including weather events, as prompts used by Samothracians to think about their ways of inhabiting their own island.
References
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Fischer-Kowalski, Marina, Markus Löw, Dominik Noll, Panos Petridis, and Nikolaos Skoulikidis. 2020. “Samothraki in Transition: A Report on a Real-World Lab to Promote the Sustainability of a Greek Island.” Sustainability 12 (5): 1932. https://doi.org/10.3390/su12051932.
García-Ruiz, José M., Estela Nadal-Romero, Noemí Lana-Renault, and Santiago Beguería. 2013. “Erosion in Mediterranean Landscapes: Changes and Future Challenges.” Geomorphology 198: 20–36. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2013.05.023.
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Mancilla-Leytón, Juan Manuel, Carmen Hernando, Jesús Cambrollé, Sara Muñoz-Vallés, Rafael Pino-Mejías, and Ángel Martín Vicente. 2021. “Can Shrub Flammability Be Affected by Goat Grazing? Flammability Parameters of Mediterranean Shrub Species under Grazing.” Sustainability 13 (3): 1555. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13031555.
Massey, Doreen. 2006. “Landscape as a Provocation: Reflections on Moving Mountains.” Journal of Material Culture 11 (1–2): 33–48. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359183506062991.
Petridis, Panos, and Marina Fischer-Kowalski. 2016. “Island Sustainability: The Case of Samothraki.” In Social Ecology, edited by Helmut Haberl, Marina Fischer-Kowalski, Fridolin Krausmann, Verena Winiwarter, 543–57. Cham: Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-33326-7_28.
Sluis, Theo Van Der, Thanasis Kizos, and Bas Pedroli. 2014. “Landscape Change in Mediterranean Farmlands: Impacts of Land Abandonment on Cultivation Terraces in Portofino (Italy) and Lesvos (Greece).” Journal of Landscape Ecology 7 (1): 23–44. https://doi.org/10.2478/jlecol-2014-0008.
Stensrud, Astrid B., and Thomas Hylland Eriksen, eds. 2019. Climate, Capitalism and Communities: An Anthropology of Environmental Overheating. London: Pluto Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvjnrw0q.
TA NEA Team. 2023. “Πυρκαγιές: Υψηλός κίνδυνος για Έβρο, Σαμοθράκη και Θάσο – Απαγόρευση κυκλοφορίας πεζών και οχημάτων.” ΤΑ ΝΕΑ. September 25, 2023. Accessed December 4, 2023. https://www.tanea.gr/2023/09/25/greece/pyrkagies-ypsilos-kindynos-gia-evro-samothraki-kai-thaso-apagoreysi-kykloforias-pezon-kai-oximaton/.
Allaby, Michael. 2013. A Dictionary of Geology and Earth Sciences. Oxford: Oxford University Press. https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780199653065.001.0001/acref-9780199653065.
Barrios, Roberto E. 2017. “What Does Catastrophe Reveal for Whom? The Anthropology of Crises and Disasters at the Onset of the Anthropocene.” Annual Review of Anthropology 46 (1): 151–66. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-anthro-102116-041635.
Basso, Keith Hamilton. 2002. Wisdom Sits in Places: Landscape and Language among the Western Apache. 7th ed. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.
Bevan, Andrew, James Conolly, Sue Colledge, Charles Frederick, Carol Palmer, Ruth Siddall, and Anna Stellatou. 2012. “The Long-Term Ecology of Agricultural Terraces and Enclosed Fields from Antikythera, Greece.” Human Ecology 41 (2): 255–72. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10745-012-9552-x.
Cruikshank, Julie. 2005. Do Glaciers Listen?: Local Knowledge, Colonial Encounters and Social Imagination. Vancouver, B. C: UBC Press.
De Martino, Ernesto. 2016. La fin du monde: essai sur les apocalypses culturelles. Edited by Giordana Charuty, Daniel Fabre, Marcello Massenzio. Translations. Paris: EHESS.
ENA Channel Greece. 2017. “Βιβλικές” Καταστροφές Στη Σαμοθράκη | Σε Κατάσταση Εκτάκτου Ανάγκη Το Νησί-Η Επόμενη Μέρα. Accessed December 4, 2023. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7RCjVHibCqg.
Eriksen, Thomas Hylland. 2016. Overheating: An Anthropology of Accelerated Change. London: Pluto Press.
Fetzel, Tamara, Panos Petridis, Dominik Noll, Simron Jit Singh, and Marina Fischer-Kowalski. 2018. “Reaching a Socio-Ecological Tipping Point: Overgrazing on the Greek Island of Samothraki and the Role of European Agricultural Policies.” Land Use Policy 76: 21–28. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2018.04.042.
Fischer-Kowalski, Marina, Markus Löw, Dominik Noll, Panos Petridis, and Nikolaos Skoulikidis. 2020. “Samothraki in Transition: A Report on a Real-World Lab to Promote the Sustainability of a Greek Island.” Sustainability 12 (5): 1932. https://doi.org/10.3390/su12051932.
García-Ruiz, José M., Estela Nadal-Romero, Noemí Lana-Renault, and Santiago Beguería. 2013. “Erosion in Mediterranean Landscapes: Changes and Future Challenges.” Geomorphology 198: 20–36. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2013.05.023.
Halstead, Huw. 2020. “Reclaiming the Land: Belonging, Landscape, and in Situ Displacement on the Plain of Karditsa (Greece).” History and Anthropology 31 (5): 643–68. https://doi.org/10.1080/02757206.2019.1696325.
Hauttecoeur, Henry. 1905. “L’île de Samothrace.” Bulletin de la Société Royale Belge de Géographie 29: 168–81.
Hutton, James. 1788. “II. The Theory of Rain.” Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 1 (2): 41–86. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0080456800029136.
Hutton, James. 1795 [1788]. Theory of the Earth with Proofs and Illustrations. Edinburgh: printed for messrs Cadell, junior, and Davies, and William Creech. https://doi.org/10.3931/E-RARA-19688.
Ingold, Tim. 1993. “The Temporality of the Landscape.” World Archaeology 25 (2): 152–74.
Irvine, Richard. 2014. “Deep Time: An Anthropological Problem.” Social Anthropology / Anthropologie Sociale 22 (2): 157–72. https://doi.org/10.1111/1469-8676.12067.
Knight, Daniel M. 2016. “Temporal Vertigo and Time Vortices on Greece’s Central Plain.” The Cambridge Journal of Anthropology 34 (1): 32–44.
Knight, Daniel M. 2021. Vertiginous Life: An Anthropology of Time and the Unforeseen. New Anthropologies of Europe 2. New York: Berghahn.
Mancilla-Leytón, Juan Manuel, Rafael Pino Mejías, and Ángel Martín Vicente. 2013. “Do Goats Preserve the Forest? Evaluating the Effects of Grazing Goats on Combustible Mediterranean Scrub.” Applied Vegetation Science 16 (1): 63–73.
Mancilla-Leytón, Juan Manuel, Carmen Hernando, Jesús Cambrollé, Sara Muñoz-Vallés, Rafael Pino-Mejías, and Ángel Martín Vicente. 2021. “Can Shrub Flammability Be Affected by Goat Grazing? Flammability Parameters of Mediterranean Shrub Species under Grazing.” Sustainability 13 (3): 1555. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13031555.
Massey, Doreen. 2006. “Landscape as a Provocation: Reflections on Moving Mountains.” Journal of Material Culture 11 (1–2): 33–48. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359183506062991.
Petridis, Panos, and Marina Fischer-Kowalski. 2016. “Island Sustainability: The Case of Samothraki.” In Social Ecology, edited by Helmut Haberl, Marina Fischer-Kowalski, Fridolin Krausmann, Verena Winiwarter, 543–57. Cham: Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-33326-7_28.
Sluis, Theo Van Der, Thanasis Kizos, and Bas Pedroli. 2014. “Landscape Change in Mediterranean Farmlands: Impacts of Land Abandonment on Cultivation Terraces in Portofino (Italy) and Lesvos (Greece).” Journal of Landscape Ecology 7 (1): 23–44. https://doi.org/10.2478/jlecol-2014-0008.
Stensrud, Astrid B., and Thomas Hylland Eriksen, eds. 2019. Climate, Capitalism and Communities: An Anthropology of Environmental Overheating. London: Pluto Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvjnrw0q.
TA NEA Team. 2023. “Πυρκαγιές: Υψηλός κίνδυνος για Έβρο, Σαμοθράκη και Θάσο – Απαγόρευση κυκλοφορίας πεζών και οχημάτων.” ΤΑ ΝΕΑ. September 25, 2023. Accessed December 4, 2023. https://www.tanea.gr/2023/09/25/greece/pyrkagies-ypsilos-kindynos-gia-evro-samothraki-kai-thaso-apagoreysi-kykloforias-pezon-kai-oximaton/.
Published
2024-11-17
How to Cite
Jaslet, Robin. 2024. “On Disquieting Ground: Erosion and Narration on Samothraki Island, Greece”. Swiss Journal of Sociocultural Anthropology 30 (1):117–128. https://doi.org/10.36950/sjsca.2024.30.9972.
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Current Research
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