Decolonising Renewable Energy: Aeolian Aesthetics in the poetry of Fatma Galia Mohammed Salem and Limam Boisha

Allan, Joanna (2020) Decolonising Renewable Energy: Aeolian Aesthetics in the poetry of Fatma Galia Mohammed Salem and Limam Boisha. Bulletin of Hispanic Studies, 97 (4). pp. 421-437. ISSN 1475-3839

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Official URL: https://doi.org/10.3828/bhs.2020.24

Abstract

In this paper I explore resistance to energy colonialism in the work of Saharawi poets Limam Boisha and Fatma Galia Mohammed Salem. I first follow the cables of the growing renewable energy infrastructure in occupied Western Sahara to make sense of how sun and wind can become enmeshed, materially and discursively, in ongoing processes of colonialism. Then I argue that Boisha and Mohammed Salem employ aeolian aesthetics in order to resist the colonizing discourses of renewable energy developers. Aeolian aesthetics are informed by wind in their structures, motifs, imagery and rhetorical devices. They make a decided appeal to the senses through which we know the wind: sound and touch, and visions of the windblown. The aeolian aesthetics that shape the Saharawi texts explored in this paper challenge hegemonic colonial understandings of wind (energy) and of Western Sahara’s desert heartlands, thereby resisting corporate discourses that enact energy colonialism.
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Exploro resistencia al colonialismo de energía en las obras de los poetas saharauis Limam Boisha y Fatma Galia Mohammed Salem. Primero, sigo los cables de la infraestructura de energía en Sahara Occidental ocupado para entender cómo sol y viento se vuelven implicados, materialmente y discursivamente, en procesos de colonialismo. Después, razono que Boisha y Mohammed Salem usan estéticas eólicas para resistir los discursos colonizadores de constructores de energía renovable. Estéticas eólicas están formadas por el viento en términos de estructura, motivos, imaginario y recursos retóricos. Hacen una llamada categórica a todos los sentidos a través de los cuales conocemos el viento: sonido y tacto, y visiones de lo que es soplado por lo mismo. Las estéticas eólicas que moldean los textos saharauis exploradas en este articulo desafían entendimientos hegemónicos de (energía de) viento y de los corazones desérticos del Sahara Occidental, así resistiendo a discursos de corporaciones que promulgan colonialismo.

Item Type: Article
Uncontrolled Keywords: Western Sahara, energy, petroculture, colonialism, wind, aeolian aesthetics
Subjects: R400 Spanish studies
T500 African studies
Department: Faculties > Arts, Design and Social Sciences > Social Sciences
Depositing User: Dr Joanna Allan
Date Deposited: 04 Jul 2019 13:15
Last Modified: 31 Jul 2021 18:16
URI: http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/id/eprint/39835

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