Animating the data

As there is no fixed method for the study of resisting choreographies (Väyrynen et al. 2017, 16−

18), I chose to create impressionistic interview portraits from the data in order to better grasp the materiality, relationality and politics of the resisting choreography of Ende Gelände (cf.

Bissell & Gorman-Murray 2019). By creating these portraits of resistance, my wish was to animate the interview data and make it more accessible, comprehensible and felt; not only on an analytical discursive level, but also viscerally and sensuously (see Vannini 2015, 318;

Haanpää 2017, 64−68; Sparkes & Smith 2012, 183). The portraits enable the incorporation of the complexity and layeredness of the feelings, narratives, pictures, affects and bodily reactions that arose throughout the interviews. In the portraits of resistance, I have composed together re-tellings and direct quotes from the interviews combined with my observations and the affects, emotions and bodily-movements of the interviewee and myself (see Bissell & Gorman-Murray 2019, 5). This was my way of creating a situated “research apparatus” that specifically suits the study of the choreography and the research questions at focus (Karen Barad cit. in Väyrynen et al. 2017, 16−17).

These portraits are divided into four different compositions, and they consist of the visual, the narrative and the movement material that emerged during the multisensory interviews. I have borrowed the notion of composition to this thesis from the practice of choreography and dance composition³¹. When writing about composition in this thesis, I refer to re-organisation, animation and contextualisation of the data fragments to an evocative form.

31 Maria del Pilar Naranjo Rico (contemporary-dance.org) defines dance composition as follows: “When we talk about dance composition, we mean that we choose a choreographic material, we arrange it according to an aesthetic idea or project and we fix it. To do that, we need first to have some choreographic fragments to work with.”

48

Trying to comprehend and animate the different facets of the resisting choreography of Ende Gelände, I examine the corporeal relations rising from the impressionistic portraits and listen to the spaces in-between the resisting bodies (cf. Chadwick 2017, 58). Furthermore, also changes and shifts in the relations interest me. Especially in the portraits composed of the body-based material, I am directing the attention to how the corporeal experience of activism also changes the body-mind of the activists in relation to climate turmoil. I analyse the impressionistic portraits from the perspectives of materiality, relationality and politics of resistance (see Väyrynen et al. 2017, 13). The body’s agentive capacity (Hast 2018, 36) is unfolding intersectionally through and from these different spheres, although it is sometimes almost impossible to separate them from each other.

The material sphere of the analysis examines the actual motility or immobility of the bodies when preparing, conducting and recovering from the action of resistance. Furthermore, the material sphere includes also the governing and disciplining bodies of the sovereign power that are represented by the police and by the private security forces of the lignite mining companies.

Moreover, the actual site of the coal mining infrastructure and the infrastructure of resistance – including the Klimacamp, action kitchens, logistics etc. – are part of this sphere of analysis.

Not to forget the artefacts of repression and resistance i.e. super-glue, white action suits, visors, police batons, pepper spray etc. (see Chabot 2015, 245−247; Butler 2016, 15).

The relational sphere is comprised of everything that is happening in-between the bodies and other materialities of the resisting choreography of Ende Gelände. This means, among others, the touch, affects, experiences and events that make the choreography living and breathing between different actors in the kinaesthetic field (cf. Parviainen 2010, 320). Through the lenses of the political sphere, the material-relational aspects of the choreography are combined with the larger politico-discursive part of the analysis (cf. Mutlu 2013, 321). Here I will be examining what the resisting choreography of Ende Gelände actually does to the script of the international politics of climate that is manifested in the local actions of Ende Gelände and on the skins of the activists themselves. These steps relate to my interest to find out what kind of relationalities emerge from the research data and how they inform my understanding on the unfolding and functioning of the choreography of resistance.

Through an analysis on the relationalities and the portraits if resistance, I aim to answer four questions. The first and overarching questions is, how the resisting choreography of Ende Gelände contests the business-as-usual of our political economy driven by the extraction and use of fossil fuels? To respond this question, I am asking how does the choreography of

49

resistance emerge? Thirdly, how does it work, and what kind of relationalities it entails? And eventually what does the resisting choreography of Ende Gelände do both materially, relationally and politically?

The kinaesthetic field in which the choreography of resistance is actually taking place contains all the bodies and objects – both those of resistance and those of governance and repression − that are part of the protest (cf. Parviainen 2010, 320). However, the kinaesthetic field also contains other people that are supporting and enabling the action through logistics, cooking and communication. Also, the multiple audiences of the resisting choreography e.g. the local villagers, the wider activist community transnationally, German politicians and investors should be considered.

I animate the ethnographic data through composition in four phases. In Composition 1., I map the kinaesthetic field of the choreography through a poetic translation of my fieldnotes (see Chadwick 2017, 71; Sparkes & Smith 2012, 183). This composition highlights the multisensorial, material and relational nature of the places the resisting choreography emerges from and is enacted in (the coal mine landscape and the Klimacamp). Furthermore, it informs the structure and functioning of the kinaesthetic fields and of the pre-choreographies (see e.g.

Haanpää 2017, 83; Parviainen 2014, 15). In this composition, I approach the research question:

How does the resisting choreography of Ende Gelände emerge?

Composition 2. animates the more narrative part of the ethnographic interviews. These portraits of resistance are condensed compositions of the semi-structured interviews and spaces of sharing I lived with the activists. They consist of direct quotes, animated quotes, re-tellings, observations on bodily reactions, and reflections on my own reactions and thoughts evoked by the interview situation (see Bissell & Gorman-Murray 2019, 5). Composition 2. gives space to the relations of care, violence and imagination that shape the choreography of resistance of Ende Gelände. The following analysing chapters transmit and unravel the functioning of these underlaying relations that enable the choreography of resistance. In this part I am exploring possible answers to the research question: How does the choreography of resistance work?

Composition 3. consists of the embodied research material of the activists who engaged in reflecting the meaning of climate turmoil and activism with their very bodies (see Stelter 20109. I have composed the embodied material into a discursive form through descriptions of the research participants who went through the body-based task. They are combined with the personal reflections of the research participants on their embodied journeys, including the

50

questions and insights the journeys evoked in them. First, I describe the embodied responses of the research participants to the image-invitations I made on climate turmoil and their activist experiences. These ethnographic vignettes include description on the body-postures, changes in alignment, spatiality, gaze and the tonality of the body, to name a few. Consequently, I have written short impressionistic portraits on the reflection I conducted with the activist after the task, or a description of the situation that followed. This third composition is approaching the question; What does the choreography of resistance do?

Composition 4. presents the co-constitutive and layered quality of the different elements that make up the resisting choreography of Ende Gelände. This visual portrait is composed from the drawings made by the research participants in the beginning of the interviews. I have combined several drawings of the activists together and placed the bodies of the activists in the context of the resisting choreography. By this composition, I intend to highlight the layeredness of the resisting choreography and the co-constitutive and co-existing role of the different relations that produce and emerge from the resistance. It is layered, mixed and messy, yet, it offers a visceral entry-point to the resistance through the visual composition of the bodies.