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The interplay between visualisations' style, content and origin show the uncomfortable mixing of the political, the environmental, and the social. Like toxic air, the story of Delhi's air pollution slips easily across different conceptual boundaries. The story is one about atmospheres - undoubtedly there, and yet, impossible to grasp. Instead, the ethnographer gestures towards it with image and language. These are fictions showing the way towards a fact, and, simultaneously, obscuring it.This set of visualisations advances understandings of what ethnography does.

The annotations in this essay intrigue the audience. They do not tell a 'truth', nor do they pretend there is one out there. They circulate fact-fictions, like the media stories they talk about. I would like to know more about how the pollution in Delhi is felt/experienced/sensed, as well as how it is talked about. This is another form of information about air pollution, which ethnography is particularly good at expressing.

The images which appear in this essay are images of information. Whether they are found, created, or found and created simultaneously, they are images which seek to communicate a 'truth'. The ethnographer puts found informational images back into circulation, placing them alongside new informational images that the ethnographer has created. The notable thing about these is their circulation on the surface of the issue - they are a re-presentation of an idea of what is happening. The scales of attention are shifting, they zoom in and out.

I do not think that 'enriching' is the point of this. The point seems to be to place imagery in circulation and in conversation. The variety of images in this conversation is what prompts reflections about toxicity, rather than a single image itself.

The images in this essay contribute to a sense that toxicity prompts, and is caught up in, political and social discourses. The commentary tells the viewer that we might only understand ambiguous, atmospheric toxcities through the lenses provided by science, media, and political statements. Toxics are therefore not seen as particles, but through words, images, attempts to provoke action. They are therefore affective existents in themselves.

In our work as social scientists, as well as in common discourse, the word toxic is applied to a wide variety of phenomena from chemicals and venoms, to viruses and bacteria, to affects, relationships, and forms of masculinity, etc. If we are seeking a clearer understanding of toxicity, it makes sense to me to ask what each of these applications have in common.

This visualization emphasizes the multinational reach of Formosa Plastics' operations (and contamination), situating the environmental implication of the company's business practices within a global context. The caption nicely frames the image, highlighting questions and gaps produced by the map. More than anything else, this visualization gives a sense of the scale of the problem posed by Formosa's extensive petrochem production line.

This caption is comprehensive in both describing in detail and critiquing the limits of the map. I would be interested in learning more about the researchers and users (are these one in the same group?) who upload the information. If I understand the caption correctly, the map shows all "petrochemical plants across the globe" and not just Formosa's. If this is the case, it runs against the assumption that I had when I first engaged with the visualization.

The scale of this image is what most stands out. As a screenshot, the image invites the viewer to navigate to the interactive map and explore the different data points. 

While this may not be possible, I feel like this image would be more effective had it been a map of Formosa-run facilities only. Another option might be to take a new screenshot after clicking on the data point of one of the Formosa facilities (I assume this would open a small pop up window with additional info or something similar) to provide a visual reference of how the map works when used as intended. A small way to bring the critique of the "god view" into the image itself might be to flip the image over its horizontal axis, to display the globe "upside-down".