Author ORCID Identifier
Date Available
6-12-2018
Year of Publication
2018
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Document Type
Master's Thesis
College
Arts and Sciences
Department/School/Program
Geography
First Advisor
Dr. Andrew Wood
Abstract
By means of a peculiar magic, insurance preserves the quantified value of capital through destructive, contingent events. The principal subjects of this project, global reinsurers, stand at the end of a long line of loss claims, holding capital together as forces threaten to tear it apart. The apocalyptic imaginaries of climate change portend events that will be increasingly destructive to capital, and insurers counter with new products and narratives. In examining reinsurers and the catastrophes they protect against, this project questions how novelty emerges from the eternal return of the same. I show how power is inscribed in the landscape, maintained through the ritual of daily reproduction, and protected from looming outliers to build a long inheritance. Using Walter Benjamin's meditations on violence, I then explore the swerves and breaks that might make the world otherwise.
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.13023/etd.2018.291
Recommended Citation
Hardesty, Robby, "CATASTROPHIC FUTURES" (2018). Theses and Dissertations--Geography. 59.
https://uknowledge.uky.edu/geography_etds/59
