Workshop
Canal Dreams. Towards a Critical History of Inland Waterways
Since late medieval times, shipping canals have been essential for inland waterway transportation. A considerable number of canal projects were proposed, discussed, and even partially constructed but failed to provide usable waterways. Recent scholarship has explored how canals were a preliminary form of geo-engineering. This interdisciplinary workshop brings together researchers who have worked on the imagination, construction and operation of artificial inland waterways throughout history.
Shipping canals have been an important feature of inland waterway navigation since late medieval times. Some canals still serve as important transport routes, others see little if any commercial traffic and plenty of pleasure boats, and some are defunct and barely visible in the landscape. At the same time, the canals that were actually built are just a fraction of those that were imagined and planned at some point in time. There is a great number of canal projects, some highly ambitious, that were proposed, discussed, and even partially constructed but failed to produce a complete, usable waterway.
Canal dreams were about more than transportation needs. They were often part of overarching schemes that sought to transform economies, create modern societies, and engage in nation-building. In hydrological terms, building canals could be an element in comprehensive plans that aimed for river regulation, independence from navigation in the open sea, or the redesign of entire river systems. Recent scholarship has explored how canals were a form of geo-engineering avant la lettre.
The workshop assembles an interdisciplinary group of researchers who have worked on the imagination, construction and operation of artificial inland waterways. Contributions explore the tension between dreams and hopes and built realities. Emphatically global in scope, the workshop builds on the assumption that canals have transnational features that provide windows on the material and imagined scaffolding of global modernity.