Articles | Volume 4
https://doi.org/10.5194/sand-4-1-2026
https://doi.org/10.5194/sand-4-1-2026
Research article
 | 
11 Mar 2026
Research article |  | 11 Mar 2026

A drop in the ocean: photographic witnessing and the Fukushima wastewater release

Fiona Amundsen

Cited articles

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Barclay, B.: Our Own Image: A Story of a Māori Filmmaker, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 128 pp., ISBN 9780816697618, 2015. 
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Bolen, J.: Site A/Plot M, [archival pigment prints], http://www.jeremybolen.com/11 (last access: 9 March 2025), 2011–2013. 
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Short summary
This article explores how languages of dilution and trace, surrounding the release of treated wastewater from Fukushima Daiichi into the Pacific Ocean, conceal eco-cultural violence. It explores this language by examining how photographic images and their meanings are socially constructed. The paper focuses on analogue photographs developed with seaweed gathered from contaminated currents; as seaweed absorbs radiation, the film becomes a material witness of diluted tritium. 
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