140 Air
There appears also be a remembering of the flux of air in how households
envisage insurance. Moment to moment, insurance shifts in and out of
focus and changes shape and form as people describe how insurance may or
may not work for them in the event of a natural disaster (Booth & Harwood
2016). Sometimes financial safety network, sometimes moral signifier, the
flux and flow of these insurantial moments signpost airy, elemental assemblages of insurance and insurability.
Instead of teetering on a crust surrounded by things, Ingold (2008) envisages a ‘weather world’ in which all is constituted through and within the
binding and unbinding of earth and atmosphere. Thoughts and actions
are immersed-emergent in the ‘incessant movements of wind and weather’
(Ingold 2008: 1803–1804). For example, in megacities, air spells out patterns
of inequity: ‘air tells us about difference… who belongs and who does not,
who is deserving and who is not’ (Adey 2013, p. 291), and air is ‘socially and
bodily significant for shaping our everyday life’ (Hauge 2013, p. 171).
Thinking through insurance as part of this atmospheric weather world is
the purpose of this section. Airy landscapes, where atmosphere meets and
entangles with earth bound objects and entities, demonstrates dimensions
of tangibility and intangibility. In the first chapter, Zac Taylor describes
how hurricane risk in Miami, Florida is ‘exported’ to Singapore as the
location of risk brokerage. These insurer practices make evident both the
globalized force of insurance markets and the specificities and conjunctures
of different types of place. The conditioned air in Singapore brokerages and
the seasonally devastating winds of the southern United States are intangibly co-constituted. Even in the same place – Cairns in cyclone-prone northern Australia – the air in the form of disaster is varied in its constitution
and tangibility. In the next chapter, Nick Osbaldiston describes how some
local residents are relatively unphased by cyclonic winds and are uninsured,
while for others this fast-paced unpredictable air is a cause of considerable
concern particularly in light of escalating insurance premiums.
In the final chapter in this section, Christine Eriksen and Jonathan
Turnbull describe how the intangibility of air – specifically air-borne radiation from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster site – contributes to a lack of insurability. The universalizing logic of insurance tends to rely on the placement
of discrete objects and entities (even if these are mobile) that are defined
and mastered through actuarialism. The limits of this become apparent as
radiation is released and travels, unseen, upon the wind. In relation to some
air and thus some places, the seeming mastery and permanence of insurance
as part of everyday life and in global finances is doubtful.
References
Adey, P 2013, ‘Air/atmospheres of the megacity’, Theory, Culture and Society, vol. 30,
pp. 291–308.
Adey, P 2015, ‘Air’s affinities: Geopolitics, chemical affect and the force of the
elemental’, Dialogues in Human Geography, vol. 5, pp. 54–75.
There appears also be a remembering of the flux of air in how households
envisage insurance. Moment to moment, insurance shifts in and out of
focus and changes shape and form as people describe how insurance may or
may not work for them in the event of a natural disaster (Booth & Harwood
2016). Sometimes financial safety network, sometimes moral signifier, the
flux and flow of these insurantial moments signpost airy, elemental assemblages of insurance and insurability.
Instead of teetering on a crust surrounded by things, Ingold (2008) envisages a ‘weather world’ in which all is constituted through and within the
binding and unbinding of earth and atmosphere. Thoughts and actions
are immersed-emergent in the ‘incessant movements of wind and weather’
(Ingold 2008: 1803–1804). For example, in megacities, air spells out patterns
of inequity: ‘air tells us about difference… who belongs and who does not,
who is deserving and who is not’ (Adey 2013, p. 291), and air is ‘socially and
bodily significant for shaping our everyday life’ (Hauge 2013, p. 171).
Thinking through insurance as part of this atmospheric weather world is
the purpose of this section. Airy landscapes, where atmosphere meets and
entangles with earth bound objects and entities, demonstrates dimensions
of tangibility and intangibility. In the first chapter, Zac Taylor describes
how hurricane risk in Miami, Florida is ‘exported’ to Singapore as the
location of risk brokerage. These insurer practices make evident both the
globalized force of insurance markets and the specificities and conjunctures
of different types of place. The conditioned air in Singapore brokerages and
the seasonally devastating winds of the southern United States are intangibly co-constituted. Even in the same place – Cairns in cyclone-prone northern Australia – the air in the form of disaster is varied in its constitution
and tangibility. In the next chapter, Nick Osbaldiston describes how some
local residents are relatively unphased by cyclonic winds and are uninsured,
while for others this fast-paced unpredictable air is a cause of considerable
concern particularly in light of escalating insurance premiums.
In the final chapter in this section, Christine Eriksen and Jonathan
Turnbull describe how the intangibility of air – specifically air-borne radiation from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster site – contributes to a lack of insurability. The universalizing logic of insurance tends to rely on the placement
of discrete objects and entities (even if these are mobile) that are defined
and mastered through actuarialism. The limits of this become apparent as
radiation is released and travels, unseen, upon the wind. In relation to some
air and thus some places, the seeming mastery and permanence of insurance
as part of everyday life and in global finances is doubtful.
References
Adey, P 2013, ‘Air/atmospheres of the megacity’, Theory, Culture and Society, vol. 30,
pp. 291–308.
Adey, P 2015, ‘Air’s affinities: Geopolitics, chemical affect and the force of the
elemental’, Dialogues in Human Geography, vol. 5, pp. 54–75.