A Geography of Gas
This portfolio is a journey of vicarious inhabitation of the Bakken region through an exploration of the oil extraction industry that has occurred in the Bakken region and through attention paid to the polyphonic and dualistic occurances within the region. Many areas of the Bakken region are beautiful prairie landscapes, rocky, hilly, mountainous, treed and wide open spaces. Other areas of the region are scarred, torn apart, contaminated and sacrificed because of human activity, namely fracking. These manifestations
coexist and merge together...
Work accidents have happened because of speed incentives that leave workers rushing at their jobs, instead of being safe. People are manipulated with money to leave their homes in order to give corporations free reign on the land. Governments have been bought off by corporations in order to quiet the concerns for the environment and people living in the Bakken region. The Bakken is a place where people and the land are dominated by human manipulation. Clearly, an in-depth, broad, intimate, empathetic, and analytical exploration is needed in order to make sense of multiple conflicting agendas.
Some issues to be explored are the uses of propaganda; the plight of victims searching for understanding; land processes; multiple perspectives that can be adopted when dealing with innovation; and the implications and consequences of innovation within the Bakken region.
The Bakken Region
The Bakken region is located in part of the North American continent in North Dakota, Montana, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan. Beneath the earth’s surface in the Bakken region, one prehistoric layer of rock leads to another deeper, more ancient layer.
The significance of these formations is that they are rich in “hydrocarbon deposits” of “oil, gas and coal” and “In the 1990’s, the geologist J.W. Price estimated that the sedimentary deposits held somewhere in an excess of 413 billion barrels of high grade petroleum (4, Karen Wilson Baptiste). Fracking is the method of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing of the shale deposits to access this oil or natural gas deep in the earth.
THROUGHLINES:
ILLUMINATING THE NEGATIVES:
DUALITY IN THE BAKKEN IN CANADA AND THE U.S.
“[Throughlines]...pertain[s] to the geomorphic, socio/cultural, economic, political, communication, technological and/or ecological characteristics of the region...to commence an investigation into the regional traits that define the people, the landscape, and the industrial features of our petro-region (Baptist, 7, Syllabus).”
Throughout the research process, connections and contradictions in the theme of propaganda and reality in the Bakken region became evident. Corporate manipulation of the media coupled with a lack of public access to relevant information sets the stage for complacency and the manipulation of the economic allocation. Propaganda is a result of the manipulation and/or omission of information in order to promote the likelihood of a certain goal. It is evident that fracking in the Bakken region has thrived, in spite of its negative impact on people, animals, and the environment - through manipulation. Powerful corporations influence the media by delaying or withholding information, therefore causing many to believe that fracking is a positive endeavour.
On the surface, it could be argued that fracking has benefitted many people, as most of the population depends on oil in their day to day life. Fracking might be viewed positively as it occurs right in the heart of North America, eliminating the need for costly and environmentally risky importation from potentially unstable countries, and fracking is an enormous factor in economic growth. Yet the deeper you go, the more negatives are revealed.
A. THE CYCLE OF BLISS
The Cycle of Bliss relating to the saying “Ignorance is Bliss,” is the name for the cycle that begins with corporations manipulating the media to reveal information a certain way, and this entering into the belief systems of the public which in turn feed into corporations economically.
“The appearance and use of form can influence culture and our perception of it. Conventions can reinforce existing stereotypes and overcoming them can be
slow and difficult. New knowledge, thinking and presentations are often perceived as threat to existing order and power... (Bowers, 1999, 10).”
B. THE EXPOSURE OF THE NEGATIVES
When one digs deeper, through a more holistic lens, it is evident that media independent from corporations expose the negatives of fracking in the Bakken region. Through news photographs, articles and films that cover the issues of explosions, deaths, illness, environmental crisis and aim to put the spotlight on the public rather than corporations. These are just a few examples of how much fracking really costs...
THROUGHLINES BOARD: OVERVIEW
Throughlines came to be a manifestation of the complexities revealed through the research with emphasis on media and image versus reality. The Throughlines board displays the simultaneity between The Cycle of Bliss and The Exposure of the Negatives. The board is a culmination of research, as the network is only possible to understand as a whole which displays the discords within. The map of the Bakken highlights the major oil cities within the region and is there to root and inform this network.
The visual symbolism in the Cycle of Bliss depicts first, the capitalist individual, an old man in a suit spinning the wheel of fortune - namely resources from the environment. Second is the media element with emotionally manipulating commercials and photography. And lastly comes the monotonous dance of the working class feeding into the capitalist cycle. The subtle pink tone of the Cycle of Bliss is depicted as a metaphor for the distraction that the media creates by hooking the public’s emotions, and offering hope for a blissful life.
The stark black inverted world of The Exposure of the Negatives is there to reveal that once one researches holistically, it is possible to see evidence of the devastation that is literally and conceptually black and white. The negatives themselves are utilized to depict the raw quality of this information; it can be hard to find through the soft pink world of Ignorance and Bliss, and yet it is there simultaneously and it
is honest and painful.
SONGLINES: CAPTURING WORDS OF ECOFEMINISM:
CAPITALISM OBJECTIFYING MOTHER EARTH
“The notion of “Songlines” was advanced by the English writer Bruce Chatwin to describe the interweaving between people and landscape in the Australian outback. Our lives are written into the landscapes in which we dwell just as the landscapes that we call “home” inscribe themselves onto our very being...(Baptist, 9, Syllabus)”
Within stories from the Bakken, people are affected by fracking, experiencing problems ranging from breast cancer and dementia due to toxins, to a destructive and corrupt sex trade. Within these narratives there is a theme of the anthropomorphizing of our planet as the feminine or violated Mother Earth.
It is as though those affected by the negatives of fracking are seeking to describe a lack - the lack of an overarching ideology that should inform policy and protect the emotional, social, financial, and environmental integrity of life in the Bakken. Meanwhile a domineering patriarchal devaluation of nurturance prevails.
The ecofeminist perspective illuminates parallel issues: objectification, power politics, dominance, control, lack of consent, indifference, victimization, and the inability for the subjugated to protect themselves and the things they care about. Everyone is ultimately impacted by the destruction of the environment.
INTRODUCTION: A GEOGRAPHY OF GAS: PERSPECTIVES IN A PETRO-REGION
Work accidents have happened because of speed incentives that leave workers rushing at their jobs, instead of being safe. People are manipulated with money to leave their homes in order to give corporations free reign on the land. Governments have been bought off by corporations in order to quiet the concerns for the environment and people living in the Bakken region. The Bakken is a place where people and the land are dominated by human manipulation. Clearly, an in-depth, broad, intimate, empathetic, and analytical exploration is needed in order to make sense of multiple conflicting agendas.
Some issues to be explored are the uses of propaganda; the plight of victims searching for understanding; land processes; multiple perspectives that can be adopted when dealing with innovation; and the implications and consequences of innovation within the Bakken region.
SONGLINES NARRATIVES
Corporate influenced media distorts and dilutes what is at stake and the negatives that people face in the Bakken due to fracking - yet the voices of the region are there to be heard by those who choose to listen.
Many individuals anthropomorphize our planet as the feminine and violated Mother Earth. They see the misuse of oil as a non-renewable resource that pollutes the earth as rooted in patriarchy - to the ultimate expense of all of humanity, nature, and the earth. It is useful to turn to a progressive ideology that honors and listens to Mother Earth and the human collective.
1. HOMELAND SECURITY Alison Hawthorne Deming
No one wants to hear again / about flaming water faucets / exploited towns and farms / heartland riddled with quakes / water poisoned and stuck back / in the ground
to find its way home. / Space might be the only way / to see what kind of sky we need...
/ We say “blue marble” we say / “Mother Earth” we say “home.” / The astronaut says “Beautiful.” / Earth from space says “Keep me.” / Homeland Security means / leave it in the ground. Lock it up / with soldiers standing guard / cover it with grassland and trees.
3. EXCERPT FROM INTERVIEW: BAKKEN, SASKATCHEWAN
Lianne Stephensen
“The oil industry was doing so much fracking as well and there are so many oil wells and pump jacks where I used to live that the methane gas smell can be very prominent to the point where you want to gag. It also affected the ground water where my parents live as my Mom was getting sick and so now they drink bottled water and only use the well water for cooking and washing dishes... They are much better off now, but we still often call it “blood money” as we do not feel that we should be earning money from the earth without working for it. It also caused so much divide and greed in my family as my grandfather would not help my family when they were going bankrupt on the farm and so as a child I grew up despising and hating the oil companies.
Also, to this day no one ever talks about the constant fracking and pollution that the oil companies caused in the area. Many people have died with dementia disorders in very high numbers and very quickly as well in the area and I often wonder whether it is because there is so much methane gas and other air and ground water pollution from about 50 years of oil industry being in our area...I do find that for women, the rigs and oil industry did not provide much work for our gender unless you were interested in trades or construction work. I always thought my brothers and other nephews and male cousins for example, as well as some of my uncles benefited more from the oil industry both in terms of employment and income.
I feel that the oil companies took advantage of people and their livelihood as they never spoke about the long term effects of
all their drilling and pump jacks and burning of methane gas could do health wise to the people in the community. I notice that places in the States seem to protest fracking, particularly companies coming to close to schools for example...On the plus side, oil industry does bring in employment and money to rural communities that were closing businesses prior and almost becoming ghost towns.
For me, I believe that we must respect the mother earth and the land that we walk on. I do not like going home sometimes and seeing people go to the casino and blow a ton of money that they did not work to earn. To me, fossil fuel is precious and has been taken for granted. I am hoping that more will be done to protect and improve our environment and scientists can find solutions such as electric or solar powered cars so that we do not depend solely on fossil fuel to get us around.
It feels good to share as...no one would talk about what the long term effects of oil drilling would do to the environment and people that lived in these rural areas. ”
SONGLINES BOARD: OVERVIEW
The Songlines board exhibits the cohesion of three narratives - a poem, “Homeland Security,” an excerpt from “A Miniature Handbook for New Women Activists,” and excerpts from Lianne Stephensen’s story that came out of the fourth interview. In gathering together insights of inhabitants of the Bakken region, their world is illuminated. The focal point of the board, Lianne Stephensen’s intimate and poignant story, allows one to delve into the everyday reality of what she experienced and what her family went through as individuals directly affected by the fracking that took place on their property in the Saskatchewan region of the Bakken. Lianne Stephensen had never been asked about her experience of fracking before this interview.
The map shown on the board is one of Lianne Stephensen’s family farm, with the depiction of oil wells and tailing ponds on her property - a startling number. The light green circle contains a scene of the past with Bison roaming free and Lianne is depicted as the woman in a light green dress, yearning for the past. The silhouetted woman is meant to represent the ecofeminist values that are undermined by capitalism and patriarchy. In the top right corner the collage of children depicts the concept within the poem, of a younger generation observing the precious earth from afar. The “blissful” pink tone is cast in the background, and embedded in the labelling of the wells and tailing ponds as a reminder as an indicator that this is within the world of the Cycle of Bliss.
“Stories are compasses and architecture; we navigate by them, we build our sanctuaries and our prisons out them, and to be without a story is to be lost in the vastness of a world that spreads in all directions like arctic tundra or sea ice. To love someone is to put yourself in their place, we say, which is to put yourself in their story, or fiture out how to tell yourself their story. (Solnit, 8, Syllabus)”