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The Power-Knowledge to Move Mountains: Subaltern Discourses of Mountaintop Removal in Coal River Valley, West Virginia

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The Power-Knowledge to Move Mountains: Subaltern Discourses of Mountaintop Removal in Coal River Valley, West Virginia Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports 2010 The Power-Knowledge to Move Mountains: Subaltern Discourses of Mountaintop Removal in Coal River Valley, West Virginia Jen Osha West Virginia University Follow this and additional works at: https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/etd Recommended Citation Osha, Jen, "The Power-Knowledge to Move Mountains: Subaltern Discourses of Mountaintop Removal in Coal River Valley, West Virginia" (2010). Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports. 3259. https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/etd/3259 This Dissertation is protected by copyright and/or related rights. It has been brought to you by the The Research Repository @ WVU with permission from the rights-holder(s). You are free to use this Dissertation in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you must obtain permission from the rights-holder(s) directly, unless additional rights are indicated by a Creative Commons license in the record and/ or on the work itself. This Dissertation has been accepted for inclusion in WVU Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports collection by an authorized administrator of The Research Repository @ WVU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Power-Knowledge to Move Mountains: Subaltern Discourses of Mountaintop Removal in Coal River Valley, West Virginia. Jen Osha Dissertation Submitted to the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences at West Virginia University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Geography Ann Oberhauser, Ph.D., Chair Brent McCusker, Ph.D. Bradley Wilson, Ph.D. Daniel Weiner, Ph.D. * Harvard Ayers, Ph.D. ** Department of Geology and Geography * Ohio University, Athens, Ohio ** Appalachian State University, Boone, NC Morgantown, WV 2010 Keywords: Mountaintop removal, Coal River Mountain, West Virginia, coal communities, surface mining, strip mining, valley fill, power knowledge, Foucault, Participatory GIS, participatory mapping, slurry impoundment, Rock Creek, Brushy Fork, Whitesville. Copyright 2010 Jen Osha ABSTRACT The Power-Knowledge to Move Mountains: Subaltern Discourses of Mountaintop Removal in Coal River Valley, West Virginia. Jen Osha This research investigates the perspectives of local residents within the Coal River Valley, WV, who are concerned about the impacts of mountaintop removal (MTR) on themselves, their families and communities, and their environment. In this dissertation, the term ‘subaltern’ represents a heterogeneous community of resistance to MTR with multiple perspectives around intersections of gender, age, and livelihood. The objectives of my study are twofold: to illuminate how dominant legal discourse continues to subjugate the discourse of resistance to MTR, and to identify possible spaces of resistance within which the subaltern discourse can challenge the power relations that continue to permit mountaintop removal in the case study area. The subaltern discourse is illustrated through 59 interviews with local residents and the construction of participatory maps showing specific concerns regarding MTR on Coal River Mountain. This participatory GIS (PGIS) project of Coal River Valley is situated within a Foucauldian framework that locates my specific case study within the larger power dynamics controlling mountaintop removal within the valley. Literature from both critical cartography and critical GIS is drawn upon to explain the “particular, local, regional knowledge” referred to by Foucault as an “insurrection of subjugated knowledges” within the Coal River Valley. The use of a PGIS approach to construct the subaltern discourse allows for local residents in the case study area to provide “expert” data regarding their concerns and to play an active role in how their concerns and home place are represented. Data collected through the construction of a mini-archeology of the legal discourse of MTR and a PGIS of Coal River Valley is used to analyze the power relations that continue to subjugate the subaltern discourse. Specific analysis focuses on the discursive formations that are not privileged as “expert knowledge” by the dominant discourse. This dissertation illustrates the concerns of local residents regarding the impact of MTR on the physical and social landscapes of their homes and recommends “spaces of resistance” within which the subaltern discourse can alter power dynamics regarding the continued permitting of MTR. Dedication To the people of Coal River and to the mountains that sustain and enrich them iii Acknowledgements This work is the culmination of a decade of relationships and four years of research in the Coal River Valley. First and foremost, I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to the families of Coal River who not only trusted me in their lives, but shared so many lessons with me about true connection to family and to the land. While I have received a fine formal education in my life, I am the most proud of the life education that I earned during my time in Coal River. I am a better mother and a better person for it, and I will pass it on as I promised. I am very grateful have had an excellent, supportive committee throughout this arduous process. I would like to thank my committee: Ann Oberhauser, Brent McCusker, Bradley Wilson, Daniel Weiner, and Harvard Ayers, for your faith and support of me. I would also like to thank Trevor Harris and Ray Hicks, who served on my committee. Every person on my committee contributed in a meaningful way to this work of scholar- activism, which was a gift of time and faith. I would like to give particular thanks to my Chair, Dr Ann Oberhauser, who helped me to stay physically and emotionally headed in the right direction, and supported me in my struggle to balance motherhood and dissertation writing. This dissertation involved a great deal of travel between Morgantown and Rock Creek, WV, where I conducted my fieldwork. I would like to thank the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences and the West Virginia University Graduate Office for my Dissertation Fellowship and for two travel grants, Arctic Voices for travel and fieldwork support, and Coal River Mountain Watch for lodging, food, and a decade of support and friendship. While the West Virginia Humanities Council did not support direct research costs, their generous support allowed for the creation of the participatory product of this research: the Journey Up Coal River website. I would also like to thank the Switzer Foundation, the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, Climate Ground Zero, Mountain Justice, Appalachian Voices, the Sierra Club, and our Aurora Lights crew for more than words can possibly express. To the Rock Creek crew, you know who you are, and you made the daily reality of this work possible. Much love and respect. Many thanks to Charles Suggs, Dea Goblirsch, Sherman Stinson, Jen Smith, Laura von Dolen, Matt Finck, Will Wickham, Eric Blevins, Jason Johnson, Laura Merner, Jordan Freeman, EmmaKate Martin, Matt Noerpel and Rory McIlmoil for help with editing, transcribing, and research. Fritz Boettner at Downstream Strategies provided essential help to me learning ArcMap, as well as creating the map of blasting on Cherry Pond Mountain. Thanks to Chad Stevens and Jordan Freeman for the use of their photographs documenting non violent direction protests on Coal River Mountain, and to Antrim Caskey for helping me figure out how to take at least a decent picture. Closer to home, I want to thank my mother Judy Osha for her support and belief in me. I wouldn’t have started this program without her, and she’s one tough woman. She doesn’t know it, but she’s my hero. To my father Frank Osha, who isn’t here to see me graduate, iv but I know he would have been really excited. Many thanks to my best friend Samatha McCreery for years of lunch breaks, GIS help, the best home-made canned chicken noodle soup ever, and her ability to make even the worst situation better! Above all, I would like to thank my husband Nick Buysse and my son, who supported me through extended periods of absence for my fieldwork and then endless hours in front of the computer. It’s finally time for some family adventures! When I get my Ph.D., each one of us gets a letter. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ii DEDICATION iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iv List of Tables ix List of Figures x List of Terms and Abbreviations xi 1) INTRODUCTION 1 2) CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK AND LITERATURE REVIEW 17 a) Foucauldian Framework b) Critical Cartography/GIS and Participatory GIS c) Appalachian Political Economy, Identity, and the Subaltern d) Conclusion 3) RESOURCE EXTRACTION AND RESISTANCE IN THE CASE 49 STUDY AREA: COAL RIVER VALLEY OF SOUTHERN WEST VIRGINIA a) Justification of Case Study Area b) Overview of Physical and Social Geography c) Coal River as Periphery: Natural Resource Extraction d) Resistance in the Coal River Valley e) Multiple Livelihood Strategies and Community Land Use f) Conclusion 4) RESEARCH QUESTIONS, METHODOLOGY AND METHODS 68 a) Research Questions b) Methodology c) Research Methods d) Conclusion 5) “HOW DO THEY GET A PERMIT FOR SUCH DEVESTATION?”: 85 MINI-ARCHEOLOGY OF THE LEGAL DISCOURSE OF MOUNTAINTOP REMOVAL AND VALLEY FILLS vi a) The Original Legal Definition of ‘Mountain Top Removal’ and ‘Valley Fills’ b) Regulatory Rule-Making c) Intersection with Case Study area d) Analysis and Conclusion 6) “SO GO THE MOUNTAINS, SO GO THE MOUNTAINEER”: 112 SUBALTERN DISCOURSES OF MTR IN THE CASE STUDY AREA a) Introduction
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