Postdoctoral position on ocean expeditions and Indigenous knowledges for ERC-funded Project OSPAPIK (Ocean and Space Pollution, Artistic Practices and Indigenous Knowledges)

The ERC-funded project OSPAPIK (Ocean and Space Pollution, Artistic Practices and Indigenous Knowledges) invites applications for one full-time postdoctoral position and one full-time postdoctoral/researcher position. The two positions are for 1,5 years (18 months) with a starting date ideally in 2024, as early as June 1^st  2024, and with the possibility to negotiate the beginning of the contract depending on ongoing commitments. This offer seeks applications for a postdoctoral position focusing on ocean expeditions and Indigenous knowledges.

Strongly grounded in anthropology and the arts, OSPAPIK (Ocean and Space Pollution, Artistic Practices and Indigenous Knowledges) is an interdisciplinary project examining the role of contemporary Indigenous artists, and non-Indigenous artists engaging with Indigenous people and knowledges, in making ocean and space pollution visible. Awarded to Géraldine Le Roux, an anthropologist and art curator (https://nouveau.univ-brest.fr/crbc/fr/membre/geraldine-le-roux), OSPAPIK interrogates how Indigenous knowledges, know-how, histories, and memories are mobilised to address current environmental crises. OSPAPIK intends to develop novel, critical, and ethnographically-informed analyses of the socio-environmental life of waste by investigating how creative and artistic expressions allow the artists themselves, scientists, expedition project organisers, and audiences to better understand how marine ecosystems and outer space are impacted by pollution. The project is designed to analyse conjointly 1/ the motifs and patterns used by Indigenous artists and non- Indigenous artists collaborating with Indigenous people and 2/ the ways these artists use ocean and outer space waste and debris as artistic material.
 OSPAPIK aims to study comparatively affective, professional, conceptual, sensorial, and historical relationships to marine, nuclear, and space debris and waste.

OSPAPIK is led by Dr Géraldine Le Roux, Principal Investigator and Director of OSPAPIK, and by Dr Estelle Castro-Koshy, Co-director and Senior Researcher of OSPAPIK at the Université de Bretagne Occidentale (UBO, University of Western Brittany), Brest, France. Over 5 years, the project will bring together anthropologists, historians, philosophers, literature and performance/theatre scholars, art historians, environmental and Indigenous studies scholars, cultural astronomers and/or astrophysicists working in different regions. Two doctoral students, will also be part of the project. The team also includes one scientific officer and one administrative and financial officer.

More about OSPAPIK: https://ospapik.eu/en/

The successful candidate will conduct an independent research project under the supervision of Géraldine Le Roux and Estelle Castro-Koshy and be an active team member of OSPAPIK. He/She/They will have the opportunity to conduct fieldwork and present findings and papers at international conferences. We are seeking a motivated candidate who is able to work independently and is a team player with good communication skills.

The successful candidate will conduct an original research project focusing on ocean expeditions and Indigenous knowledges that addresses OSPAPIK central themes.

OSPAPIK studies the collaborative processes initiated between Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists, and between non-Indigenous expedition project organisers and Indigenous communities. This postdoctoral project will focus on marine expeditions and study ways of engaging with pollution – especially plastic pollution – in the ocean. It will examine the connections marine expedition leaders, engineers, and volunteers committed to fighting plastic and ocean pollution establish between their work and Pacific cultures.

The research project will address (some of) the following questions:

- Do ocean expeditions to and in the Pacific follow specific routes? How are the routes and stop-overs determined? What sort of cultural and environmental knowledges are shared and/or transferred and/or overlooked during these expeditions?

- Do ocean expedition participants take Indigenous views, knowledges or protocols into account? When they do so, how are their understanding of environments that are affected by pollution renewed or impacted?

- What are the local perceptions of these expeditions, their arrival and their short and long-term benefits? What is the local history of such expeditions?

- What role artists play in making expeditions visible?

- Do ocean expeditions transform participants, and how?

The postdoctoral researcher will conduct a series of interviews with expedition project organisers engaging with plastic and ocean pollution. OSPAPIK is particularly interested in expeditions on which artists embark or have embarked: ideally, the postdoctoral researcher will map a cartography of expeditions in the Pacific on which artists have embarked. Research on expeditions (leaders) based in France and/or in the Pacific are particularly welcome. (Another OSPAPIK PhD project will conduct research dedicated to the study of artworks made on boats.)

The successful candidate will:

• develop and complete a research project on ocean expeditions and Indigenous knowledges
• publish peer-reviewed/high quality journal articles and/or book chapters
• present research findings at scholarly and public events
• contribute to OSPAPIK research seminars
• organise or co-organise seminar events, with OSPAPIK team members and administrative and financial officer’s help
• adhere to ethical protocols and provide ethical clearances and copyrights for fieldwork, publications, interviews, and audiovisual recordings
• produce posts on their research milestones and publications for the project website or social medial channels used by the project
• be in charge of some administrative duties, which may include: updating the project bibliographical database; and/or writing up minutes of research meetings to be shared with the team; produce media posts or material on OSPAPIK events.

Optional duties:

• seek further funding for fieldwork, publications, or further involvement with the project
• assist the PI in the conceptual and/or logistic organisation of some sections of the touring exhibition that will take place on a boat at the end of the project
• co-edit project publications in collaboration with other project team members

Any other duties as required by OSPAPIK.