理論化大氣警戒中的「運動」：香港流水革命中的情動主體化與軀體參與

Theorising“Movement”in Atmospheric Policing: Affective Subjectification and Somatic Engagements in the Hong Kong Be Water Revolution

催淚瓦斯是當代都市維安中常見的「大氣警戒」（atmospheric policing）武器，透過空氣滲入身體每一處孔隙進行鎮壓，使其失能，進而剝奪抗議者的呼吸與公民權利。本文承接政治地理學者Mikko Joronen的「負面球域棲居」（negative sphere-dwelling）概念，以及環境人類學者Tim Ingold關於「在天氣世界中棲居、尋路、感知」的論述，進一步探討大氣暴力中的「運動」（movement）本身，追溯香港流水革命抗議者如何在毒氣的湍流和惑亂中，展露多樣的情動主體化（affective subjectification）路徑。大氣警戒雖然帶來壓迫，卻也激發生成性的政治動能。對此，我從情動理論及女性主義思想家Sara Ahmed、身體人類學者Annemarie Mol的現象學取徑切入，強調抗議者以脆弱之身穿越大氣警戒，展開情動的重新定向與意義轉化。特別是，「食催淚彈」與「如水抗爭」這兩個物質隱喻凸顯流水革命中兩種關鍵的「身體─環境」共構模式：其一為「呼吸─情動具身化」（breathingaffective embodiment），其二為「軀體─物質參與」（somatic-material engagement）。兩者闡明了抗議現場中知覺感知與都市環境的互為塑造，為我們重新思考社會「運動」與物質纏繞之分散式集體政治，提供一個反思性的「情動─主體」理論基礎。這種關注呼吸、更「接地氣」（down-to- earth）的「運動」視野，亦有助批判既有抗議政治研究中過度結構化、僵固且靜態的理論模型，以捕捉當代都市抗爭中身體、環境、物質與技術之間動態的共構及實作關係。

Tear gas has become a prevalent tool of atmospheric policing in contemporary urban security. By infiltrating the air, it renders the body vulnerable, enacting a suspension of citizenship through the act of“breathtaking”. Building upon political geographer Mikko Joronen’s (2023a) concept of negative sphere-dwelling and anthropologist Tim Ingold’s (2010) discussions of dwelling, wayfaring, and perceiving within the weather-world, this paper redirects analytical focus to the very movements that emerge within and through atmospheric violence. It examines how protesters in the Hong Kong Be Water Revolution (2019–2020) navigated the conflict-ridden urban atmospheres, giving rise to diverse trajectories of affective subjectification. Drawing on affect theory in general and phenomenological approaches articulated by feminist theorist Sara Ahmed (2006) and anthropologist Annemarie Mol (2021) in particular, I explore how protesters undergo bodily transubstantiation in the face of tear gas. Rather than viewing atmospheric policing solely as an oppressive apparatus, I argue that it also has a generative dimension. Protesters entangled with tear gas are shaped by their encounters with atmospheric turbulence and the urban environment, giving rise to dynamic processes of reorientation that open up shared affective spaces of breathing-together (同呼吸tung4 fu1 kap1). Central to this analysis are two material metaphors—eating tear gas (食催淚彈sik6 ceoi1 leoi6 daan2) and resisting like water (如水抗爭jyu4 seoi2 kong3 zaang1)—which illuminate two key modes of body–environment co-constitution: (1) breathing–affective embodiment and (2) somatic–material engagement. On the one hand, protesters’initial encounters with tear gas provoke affective disorientation and fear, which gradually unfold into ethical imaginaries emerged through involuntary breathing, spontaneous care, and collective improvisation. On the other hand, the Be Water Revolution engenders subversive and radicalised bodily practices in tandem with strategic crowd mobilities. Protesters traverse the urban landscape in guerrilla-like fashion, evading police encirclement and attuning themselves to high-risk environments, while simultaneously reconfiguring the social functions and meanings of urban space. The motto resisting like water signifies not only tactical adaptability, but also the fluid reconfiguration of protest subjectivity and perception of bodies-in-motion. Such transformation unfolds along two interrelated dimensions: first, a material reorientation, wherein protesters appropriate everyday objects as resistant matters; and second, a spatial reorientation, through which the body cultivates differentiated and fine-grained geographical sensibilities and kinesthetic intelligence via embodied movement. Hence, although tear gas aims to temporarily“clear”or reoccupy space by constraining breath, the potentialities of movement remain far from exhausted. Protesters subjected to atmospheric violence are not reducible to bare life; they continuously negotiate and recalibrate their relations with socio-material environments. Significantly, seasoned protesters begin precisely from the vulnerability of sphere-dwelling, enacting creative forms of resistance through coordinated actions across both digital and physical terrains. In doing so, they are capable of transforming the affective intensities of atmospheric policing into generative forces and opportunities for social mobilisation. Thus, material metaphors such as eating tear gas and resisting like water provide a critical lens for reconsidering the dispersed and relational nature of political agency within contemporary social movements. By foregrounding breath and material entanglement, this paper proposes a“down-to-earth”theorisation of movement in atmospheric policing that challenges both structurally rigid and static models in the study of contentious politics, highlighting instead the dynamic co-constitution of bodies, materialities, technologies, and atmospheres.