Land-centric narratives of national growth and expansion are central to the US mythmaking and historiography. Yet, it is water that made America. Water bodies powered the nation’s industrialization, propelling it from colony to superpower, and informed its communities’ identities. At the same time, the restrictions imposed on water access along racial, economic, or political lines exposed the exploitative and contradictory aspects of its democratic project. From the first Atlantic crossings to the redefinition of the nation’s borders, from the transformation of domestic geographies to the degradation of global environments, how America – its peoples, cultures, and institutions – has related to water resources has played a central role in defining US’s historical trajectory.

This roundtable explores the multifaceted role of water in American history, bringing together different perspectives to examine how local, state, and federal actors interacted with and impinged on the country’s – in fact, the planet’s – water bodies.

A foundational component of this blue-tinted account of the country’s past and present is the relationship between water and the system of racial inequality and environmental injustice that has structured and scarred American society. Since the transatlantic slave trade, when oceanic crossings became a source of profit for the slave traders and trauma for enslaved people, the management of freshwater and waterways, the utilitarian and imperialistic approach to water infrastructure, and the anthropic intrusion into marine environments have been part and parcel of America’s rise and projection of power. In this context, water’s availability shaped patterns of settlement and urbanization, exclusion and segregation, testing the premises and functioning of the American experiment and leading to a continuous renegotiation of the nation’s citizenship.

Constitutive features of these transformations have been the technological innovations that have enabled Americans to harness, control, and securitize water, such as the construction of dams and canals, as well as the over-reliance on water-depleting industries such as the petrochemical and nuclear ones, which have often resulted in dystopian processes of environing and communities’ displacement.

Along with these themes and material practices, the roundtable aims to bring to the center of our shared historical reflection also the cultural significance of water in American art, literature, and popular culture, where this element acted as a reflection of the country’s composite history and heritage, and has often symbolized the country’s vastness, diversity, and power, as well as its aspirations and challenges.

By bringing together scholars from different backgrounds, this roundtable will provide a rich exploration of the role that water has played and keeps playing in American history. Today, America’s use and abuse of water resources represent one of the country’s most impactful and significant legacies in the Anthropocene. Our discussion will highlight how water has shaped the nation’s economic, social, and cultural development and will provide insights into the challenges and opportunities that water presents for the future of the United States.