In the Shadow of the Seawall

In the Shadow of the Seawall journeys to the edge of the sea to examine the existential dilemma of seawalls alongside struggles for resilience and adaptation. In coastal management debates, seawalls are a deeply contested subject: some experts favour hard structures for mitigating the impacts of sea change, while others advocate measures modelled on natural processes.

Summer Gray argues that both approaches involve limited notions of resilience that undermine movements for social and climate justice. Instead, she introduces the concept of placekeeping—the struggle to resist colonising practices of displacement—as a justice-oriented framework for addressing the global dangers of coastal disruption.

Drawing on a mix of ethnographic observation, interviews, and archival research, Gray shows how competing logics of adaptation play out on the ground in Guyana and the Maldives. She reveals how seawalls are entrenched in relationships of power and entangled in processes of making and keeping place.