Thinking Through Seawater: An (Auto)ethnographic Exploration of Different Waters in Brazil

Abstract

This paper attempts to respond to the call for an ecological turn in intercultural communication research and approaches this goal through (auto)ethnographic accounts of different waters in Brazil. Moving from a neglected swimming pool in São Paulo to the turbulent waves of Santos Bay, it examines how water shapes human and more-than-human interactions, reflecting historical, colonial, and ecological entanglements. Drawing on literature from posthumanism and Marine STS, this paper develops a theoretical framework that approaches water as both a medium and a method for rethinking ontological and epistemological boundaries, offering ways to reimagine ethnological methods in intercultural communication research, while emphasizing the need for interdisciplinarity.