For granular geography

Abstract

This article makes the case for developing granular geographies as an intervention into materialist geography. It does so by exploring sand extraction, which has so far been little explored within human geography, and how the granular dynamics of force chains, friction, and phase transitions make the discrete geographies of sand’s commodification porous to one another. By framing sand’s materiality through granular relations, I examine the ubiquity of sand in contemporary urbanization and its transformation into a resource. This is illustrated through a focus on Singapore’s excessive appetite for importing sand to fuel construction and its extensive land reclamation project, mapping sand’s trajectory as a resource from cheap nature to sovereign territory.