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80°08’ S, 163° 57’ W: Ice, Interior and Inhabitation
Citation
Nieboer, M, 80 08' S, 163 57' W: Ice, Interior and Inhabitation, HASSEG Conference 2017: Depths and Surfaces: Understanding the Antarctic Region through the Humanities and Social Sciences, 5-7 July 2017, Hobart, Tasmania (2017) [Conference Extract]
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Abstract
80°08’ S, 163° 57’ W, on the vast surface of the Ross Ice Shelf, defined the location of the Bolling
Advance Weather Base, the accommodation of Richard Byrd during the winter of 1934. These
coordinates, however say nothing about the base’s relationship to the depths of the ice mass itself.
While Antarctic stations of recent decades are climatically sealed off from their extreme
environment, the huts of the earlier explorers were much more permeable structures. Byrd’s hut,
uniquely, was deliberate built in the ice of the continent’s interior. This confined habitable pocket of
air inside the ice, served as laboratory for scientific observations of atmospheric phenomena and for
investigation into the expedition leader’s own psychological response to freezing solitude. Byrd’s hut,
which is literally of the environment, offers the opportunity to investigate how Antarctica, as it
challenges the human senses, alters a conventional understanding of interior space and the concept
of interiority itself. This paper contributes to the short history of human habitation in Antarctica and
thus to an emerging body of knowledge of human engagement with the continent. The study is
informed by a close reading of the collaborative autobiography ‘Alone’ alongside archival research
and architectural analysis. The sub-glacial interior of Byrd’s hut, I argue, is not only an observatory for
the weather and the human psyche, but also for interior space itself.
Item Details
Item Type: | Conference Extract |
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Keywords: | Antarctic humanities, interior theory, cultural studies |
Research Division: | Built Environment and Design |
Research Group: | Architecture |
Research Field: | Architectural design |
Objective Division: | Expanding Knowledge |
Objective Group: | Expanding knowledge |
Objective Field: | Expanding knowledge in human society |
UTAS Author: | Nieboer, M (Dr Miranda Nieboer) |
ID Code: | 140630 |
Year Published: | 2017 |
Deposited By: | Architecture and Design |
Deposited On: | 2020-09-01 |
Last Modified: | 2020-10-26 |
Downloads: | 0 |
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