Blue Humanities and the Color of Colonialism

Abstract

The cultural study of water has seen a prismatic shift toward the color blue. This is often articulated as a move away from the terrestrial focus of green ecologies and environmentalism, toward blue aquatic inquiries. What happens when green becomes blue and the blue humanities take shape under the umbrella of the environmental humanities? This article examines the blue humanities to argue that its blues address colonial inheritances and critique colonial desires. Blue has long appealed to the colonial imaginary; it drew European ships across the seas to mine blue pigment from Afghan rocks and raise indigo plantations on stolen land, with stolen labor. The article analyzes the lapis lazuli series by Dutch artist Pieter Paul Pothoven and the performance of the poem “Unity” by Aotearoa New Zealand poet Selina Tusitala Marsh. Pothoven’s work shows how blue analysis accounts for the fact that the color blue has built empires, taken lives, and altered environments. Marsh’s poetry and presence in the heart of the British Empire visualizes blue resistance against imperial power and the persistent defiance of colonization in the Pacific region. The article argues that blue transoceanic European and Pacific colonial connections become disarticulated in the blue humanities and their aquatic encounters.