Performativity, politics, and the production of social space: Geographies of peace

Abstract

An emerging field of geographical research is making a concerted effort to engage with the everyday “off the page” political geographies and the alternative spaces of politics and geopolitics. Human Geography has benefited from the “cultural turn” that has enabled close consideration of how space is practiced and performed. The two books reviewed here, acknowledge their own genesis within a rapidly shifting political landscape, which encompassed uprisings and occupations, and where the geographies and practices of protest, solidarity, and non-violent resistance became popularised through both a material presence in major cities, a virtual presence across social media, and through the media spectacle of streets becoming camps and the underdog being seen to take on state forces. As the media gaze shone on these sites, many acts of solidarity, protest, non-violence, and peace remained hidden from view, including most of the everyday practices of resistance and prefiguration that gave birth to new Political orders, such as Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain.