The Third Bank of the Sea: Maritime Traces of Constitutive Outside(r)s and International Ontopolitical Lines

Abstract In this article, we move into the water and engage with maritime traces of constitutive outside(r)s and international ontopolitical lines. Inspired by João Guimarães Rosa’s ‘The Third Bank of the River’ and by Jacques Derrida’s work, we offer a decolonial deconstructionist rethinking of the problem of the constitutive outside in relation to Atlantic traces of constitutive outsiders of the modern international world. Our main argument is that, negatively and ontopolitically constituted as constitutive outside(r)s of the modern international world, the outlawed pirate, the enslaved Black African and the savage Indian legitimized asymmetrical structures of relations, counterconcepts and grammars of violence. In other words, we argue that their individual bodies, histories and (counter-)archives provide Atlantic traces of a profoundly dehumanizing, abject, and racist form of world othering and ordering. In order to articulate its contribution, the article is structured in four sections. The first section engages with maritime traces of constitutive outside(r)s of the modern international world. The second section engages with the exceptional category of the outlawed pirate. The third section turns to the enslaved Black African and the Atlantic colour line. The fourth section questions the international ontopolitical lines and asymmetrical relations accompanying these exceptional categories of constitutive outside(r)s.