Spatial and temporal ways of knowing sea level rise: Bringing together multiple perspectives

Abstract

Sea level rise presents risks to ecosystems, populations, and infrastructure in low-lying areas. This article considers diverse ways of knowing, understanding, and experiencing these risks. It explores differences and connections between knowledge produced through the technological methods of scientific research and that which emerges through the experiences and insights of local people. For example, while scientific assessments measure and forecast, among other things, the height and rate of vertical change in the sea level using instruments such as tide gauges and radar-firing satellites, for local populations sea level rise is largely perceived and knowable through everyday processes and ..