What Water Does with Us? Understanding Water in a Multipolar Anglo Community

James W. Underhill

doi:10.18290/rh21695-8

James W. Underhill University of Rouen, Normandie, France https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3249-9905

Keywords: Anglo community, corpus, multipolar community, water, water supply, waters

Abstract

Water is so omnipresent, so vital, and so inescapable, it seems that we take it for granted. But while scientists are discovering exciting new things about water’s composition and forms, in the popular imagination, water remains a primal, ‘simple,’ ‘elemental experience.’ Water attracts us and repels us; water inspires fear in us. What stories do we tell about water in English? How do we understand it? The object of the present paper is to gain an accurate overall impression of the diverse, complex and contradictory ways the ‘Anglo community’ – as a diverse multipolar community living around the world – understands waters and its relation to them. Exploring ‘English waters’ will take us from Scotland to Australia, from the Bible to online linguistic corpora, from Canadian celebrations of lakes and ravines to forest fires in California.

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