INDIAN OCEAN EMPIRE
I N T H E
AGE OF
STEPHEN J. RAMOS (University of Georgia)
Mapping Gulf Infrastructure and Territory
The talk begins with concepts of territory, territoriality, and sovereignty as essential components in the negotiation and struggle for Gulf mapping. While the concept of mapping is recently associated with exploratory methodologies in spatial analysis and in the social sciences, here the process of mapping considers its historic agency as both purveyor and arbiter of colonial and corporate power essential to the production of Gulf oil modernity. Reviewing the survey, demarcation, and territoriality of the Gulf region during the ascendancy of oil helps to consider how these processes might continue to layer and transmogrify “after oil.”
Stephen Ramos is an associate professor of urbanism in the College of Environment + Design at the University of Georgia. His research focuses on port cities, logistics, territory, and energy transition. He is author of Dubai Amplified: The Engineering of a Port Geography (Ashgate 2010; Routledge 2016), co-editor of Infrastructure Sustainability and Design (Routledge 2012), a founding editor of New Geographies (GSD/Harvard University Press), and an associate editor for Planning Perspectives.