organic surveillance:
zine series

organic surveillance is a zine series conceptualized by P.h.D student and research assistant nilofer rauha. This zine series coexists alongside the various other projects at surveillart, and explores ideas surrounding surveillance, land relations, art-creation, and territoriality. This first issue was created shortly after rauha’s first trip to Sudbury for the watching territory project.

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The concept "organic surveillance" was first introduced in Dr. McKnight's Master's of Arts project, "Organic Surveillance: Security and Myth in the Rural" (2016). They define organic surveillance as a form of surveillance practiced by ruralists to manage land, particularly 'private property' from trespassers. Dr. McKnight defines organic surveillance as an individual application of surveillance culture, borrowed and inspired by urban forms of policing and control. The organic aspect brings attention to the pervasiveness of surveillance technologies in nature and forested areas, while acknowledging that like organisms, surveillance practices and technologies are adaptable, and ever changing to various landscapes and uses. How we manage land as individuals and ruralists is inextricably linked to the ways that surveillance operates as a colonial logic for displacement, resource extraction, and capitalism. Organic surveillance then, is a form of surveillance culture and behaviour that reveals the ways that humans, particularly settlers, integrate technology and deterrence mechanisms for our own benefits.

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