Swelling Horizons: Coloniality, Sea-Level Rise, and their Otherwise

‘Sea-level rise’ is widely used to denote the severity of climate change. This article argues that the concept is also shaped by a colonial grammar of relating to the ocean while its use may affectively standardise frontline communities. To reorient such ways of relating to aqueous catastrophe, the article dwells on the concept of ‘swelling horizons’. Noticing the swells of late-liberal horizons generates an otherwise which prompts reorientations; in-between terrestrial horizons and submersive thought, attentive to multiple times and spaces, prepositionally resourceful, and attuned to the heaviness of climate coloniality.