"I connect to the water through the heart now – rather than through the head" ~ Kate Faulkes

Right to Thrive explores local people's connections to the River Don through a collection of generative interviews. In this series we encourage people to question extractive, human-centred views of nature in favour of recognising and celebrating its right to thrive.

Canal resident and History and Archaeology PhD student Kate Faulkes tells us about living in a boat and how it has changed her relationship to water.

Kate Faulkes is a History and Archaeology PhD student who lives on a boat on the Sheffield Tinsley Canal. In this generative interview Kate tells us about her new connection to water and seeing it as a living entity, and how she thinks we can form better relationships with our waterways.

Kate Faulkes

First of all, thank you for talking to us. Could you tell me a bit about the work you do and your interest in the River Don?

My work is not particularly related to the River Don, but my main connection to the River Don is that I live on a boat on the Sheffield Tinsley Canal, which obviously is heavily attached to the Don because it was created to link up the town of Sheffield, which was very still very isolated, to the bit where the River Don’s navigable just below Tinsley. My PhD comes under History and Archaeology, and I am studying early 19th-century industrial populations. So although my interest is not primarily about the water, it's very hard to make sense of early 19th century industrial Sheffield without understanding the water.

The canal was one of the few things that enabled the town to take manufacturing to the next level really, because before, it couldn't ever get enough raw materials in and it couldn't get enough finished products out. So although it's not actually my PhD topic, it's hard not to run across it quite regularly.

But also, living on the water gives you a very different perspective on what you think about the river, what's happening to it and what's happened to it in the past. It feels much more like a living thing to me than I think that some of the people who've come and cycled past it or walk their dogs or whatever. I love to see the canal towpath used – don't get me wrong – but I think they will just see it as, 'Oh, isn't that pretty?' Whereas I see it as a living entity, I think.

How did you end up living on a houseboat?

Fell in love with a man who lived on a boat! He's also an archaeologist and our eyes met across a crowded trench about six years ago. I just fell in love with the lifestyle. And you know what? It was the best decision I've made. I can’t imagine living in a house now.

It’s completely different, though much harder work.

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