Seapunk

Names

• Seapunk
• seapunk
• SEApunk is the initial variant, before the capitalization was simplified as convention (Seapunk and seapunk are the preferred defaults today)
• SEAPunk and SEA Punk are sometimes seen, but not considered canon
• Not to be confused with "seapunk" of the Tumblr era that referred to aquatic-inspired aesthetics. The current (post-2024 Substack-era) seapunk / Seapunk described here refers to Southeast Asian-inspired Solarpunk aesthetics and imaginaries.

Origin

Seapunk was coined by Sam Chua on March 14 2024 as a Southeast Asian "dialect" of solarpunk (see accompanying screenshot of original message). Note: the term would subsequently come to be simplified to Seapunk or seapunk for general usage.

At the first day of the Datus & Nusas workshop on 27 May 2024, the opening icebreaker exercise involved every participant writing down their name and one word they personally associated with Southeast Asia on a Post-it Note. Sam Chua wrote 'SEAPUNK' on his, and this was probably the first IRL proliferation of the term.

Following the inaugural Seapunk Playshop in October-November 2024, Seapunk Studios was formed as a label for the research-and-imagination collective interested in seapunk imaginaries, with the broader aspiration of seapunk entering the public lexicon as a lowercase genre, aesthetic, and imaginary.

Definition & Description

• There are three layers of meaning associated with Seapunk (as Sam and Seapunk Studios describe it):

1. South-East-Asia-punk with SEA as general shorthand for Southeast Asia, and -punk as indicative of genre, aesthetic, and imaginaries; and especially in relation to solarpunk, which Seapunk likes to imagine itself as a grounded regionalized subset of.
2. Sea-punk as a political and cultural aesthetic of small sovereignty enabled by big commons, inspired by the historical open seas and trade routes of the world, but especially Southeast Asia, where the sea served as a big connective commons that linked diverse peoples and cultures through trade and exchange and generally resisted any attempts at overt centralized control.
3. C-punk as the idea of an "Option C" or a third way as an innovative "punk" instinct that looks for ways to think beyond and circumvent false dichotomies and tradeoffs (System A or System B, Hegemon A or Hegemon B).

Artists and Creators

• Sam Chua (MYS)
• Seapunk Studios

Events, Performances, Screenings

• Seapunk Playshop — A Co-Imagination Camp, Chiang Mai, Thailand, October 21 - November 03, 2024.
• Khlongs & Subaks Workshop, Bangkok, Thailand, April 21 - 25, 2025.
• Good Ghosting: A Haunting-By-Design Sci-Fi-Imagining Workshop, Chiang Mai, Thailand, July 12, 2025.
• La La Libraries — A Bibliotactics × Seapunk Library Design Jam, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, August 9, 2025.

Discussions and Panels

• "Seapunk: Experiments in Co-Imaginative Worldcrafting", APF Brownbag Series #2, Association of Professional Futurists, Online discussion with Sam Chua, April 04 2025.

• "Silicon Archipelago: A Salon on Open Distributed Southeast Asian Tech Futures" Online salon with video recording and slides.

Conferences and Symposia

• Seapunk Symposium, Furama Chiang Mai, November 01 2024.
• Seapunk Midsummer Studio highlights post, July 2025.

Publications

Magazines, Journals, Blogs and Websites

• Seapunk and Seapunk Studios homepage
• Seapunk Newsletter

Videos, Podcasts, Radio

• South Beast Asia A fictional world haunted by AIs in all sorts of (mostly) friendly living forms, South Beast Asia is a collective protocol design fiction co-imagination of a few dozen researchers at the April 2025 Khlongs & Subaks workshop in Bangkok. Collection of videos, artifacts, and essays.
• "Sam Chua: Orang Besar, Protocols Thinking, Seapunk, Cybernetics (Venkatesh Rao Universe)", Discussion between Kahlil Corazo and Sam Chua, Explorations.ph, March 24 2025. Video and Text.

Essays, Articles, Book Chapters

• Yan "We have always been Seapunks", Living with Shoggoths, December 26 2024.

• Jules Yim ｜ 芊文, "10 Mar 25 Monday Briefing: From seas to khlongs and subaks – an open invitation", The Contrapuntal, March 10 2025.

• Paul Millerd "Thinking About Southeast Asia & Intellectual Work", Pathless, July 22 2025.

• Roger Qiu "Strange Attractors and Systems Thinking in Southeast Asia", Matrix AI, July 13 2025.

See Also

seapunk (lowercase), Solar Punk, Futurisms, Tropical Futurism(s), Asian Futurism(s), Southeast Asian Futurism(s), Archipelagic Futurisms, Nusantara Futurisms