Cirrus@Austlit

'Rachel Carson, in The Sea Around Us, wrote that we carry the sea in our bodies (1951). Our bodily engagements with the sea can engender a sense of oneness; literature about the sea, and about surfing, often reflects this. Yet, even when we are in the sea, we might struggle to see beyond ourselves: the sun gets in our eyes; our image is reflected on the surface of the water; in the case of surfers, we only have eyes for the next wave. As Kanaka Hawaiian scholar Karin Amimoto Ingersoll, herself a surfer, notes: ‘Despite our perceived identities as organic beings, surfers are neither innocent nor benign voyagers, and our experiences and our practices often escape our intentions and philosophies’ (2016, p. 4). Embracing a materially- immersed subjectivity that is both embodied and porous, which Stacy Alaimo calls trans-corporeality, my essay seeks to emulate the sea’s energy in content and form, riding a wave of embodied creative-critical writing-thinking. I will contemplate the interrelationships between surfing, writing and practice-led research and in doing so demonstrate how surfing has influenced both my writing and thinking, while exploring how trans-corporeality offers an ethical and methodological basis for writing in/with/from the intertidal zone.' (Publication abstract)