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Full Description
In our "wireless" world it is easy to take the importance of the undersea cable systems for granted, but the stakes of their successful operation are huge, as they are responsible for carrying almost all transoceanic Internet traffic. In The Undersea Network Nicole Starosielski follows these cables from the ocean depths to their landing zones on the sandy beaches of the South Pacific, bringing them to the surface of media scholarship and making visible the materiality of the wired network. In doing so, she charts the cable network's cultural, historical, geographic and environmental dimensions. Starosielski argues that the environments the cables occupy are historical and political realms, where the network and the connections it enables are made possible by the deliberate negotiation and manipulation of technology, culture, politics and geography. Accompanying the book is an interactive digital mapping project, where readers can trace cable routes, view photographs and archival materials, and read stories about the island cable hubs.
Contents
Preface. Edges ix
Acknowledgments xv
Introduction. Against Flow 1
1. Circuitous Routes. From Topology to Topography 26
2. Short-Circuiting Discursive Infrastructure: From Connection to Transmission 64
3. Gateway: From Cable Colony to Network Operations Center 94
4. Pressure Point: Turbulent Ecologies of the Cable Landing 138
5. A Network of Islands: Interconnecting the Pacific 170
6. Cabled Depths: The Aquatic Afterlives of Signal Traffic 198
Conclusion. Surfacing 225
Notes 235
Bibliography 263
Index 281
