{ conduction }
A conductor is an object or type of material that allows the flow of electric current in one or more directions. Conduction is the transmission between conductors. The word is derived from the Latin word condūcō meaning to lead, draw together, assemble, and to connect or unite. It is also related to the word dūcō, meaning to guide. In a world shaped by Modern thought, knowledge has been compartmentalized into separate entities, engendering an understanding of objects as things-in-themselves (Latour, 1993)[1]. In such a context, a disruptive project can emerge by tracing different flows, which will highlight the interconnection between matter that tends to be seen as disparate. Using the etymology of conduction as a conceptual framework leads to disclosing the connections brought about by the emergence of hydropower as well as the guiding principles, or ideologies, behind it. Starting to read phenomena as conductors means opening up for a reading of objects as hybrid. A circuit diagram is an engineering device that in a simplified manner represents conduction within a closed system. Shifting scales, the diagram can be misused to visualize the flows of the colonizing apparatus of hydropower. Such a scheme will be an assembly of objects, sites, events, and individuals, interlinked by the conduction of materia and ideology.
[1] Latour, B. (1993) We Have Never Been Modern. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, p.4.