Related Papers
Pirates, Slaves, and Profligate Rogues: Sailing Under the Jolly Roger in the Black Atlantic
Pirates in the Black Atlantic
2019 •
Victoria Barnett-Woods
The age of piracy in the Atlantic world spanned nearly a century, beginning in 1650 and ending in the late 1720s. The rise of Atlantic piracy coincides with the rise of the increasing maritime trade, particularly with the establishment of the transatlantic slave trade between the African continent and the American colonies. There are multiple accounts of pirate ships that have attacked slavers along the littoral states of either side of the Atlantic. In these moments of piratical enterprise, the “thieves and robbers” of enslaved Africans themselves become themselves the victims of robbery and violence. Also, in these moments, the very embodiment of liberation (the pirate) encounters the distillation of oppression and disenfranchisem*nt (the enslaved). This chapter will discuss the significance of these encounters through the lenses of both transatlantic commerce and the human condition. At the intersection of piracy and the slave trade, there are dozens of stories to be told, and with their telling in this chapter, a new vision of the maritime world demonstrates what it may cost to truly be free. In a series of case studies, this chapter will examine an arc of Atlantic piracy during its golden age. I will establish piratical views toward the enslaved with a close reading of Dampier’s New Voyage Round the World specifically focusing on his time on the Bachelor’s Delight (1697), to then discuss the accounts of four pirate captains at the height of piracy’s “golden age.” These men—Hoar, Kidd, Roberts, and Teach—all gained significant notoriety during their exploits, but also represent the ways in which pirate captains viewed men of African descent within their framework of being “gentlemen of fortune.” For Bartholomew Roberts, for example, one-third of his crew was composed of formerly enslaved men. Both Hoar and Kidd, with unique visions of the capacity of the formerly enslaved, had black men as their Quartermaster-- one of the most critical administrative positions of any vessel. The stories of these men and pirates will be at the heart of this discussion, hopefully illuminating the raw and powerful intersection of trade, slavery, and freedom on the high seas in the early eighteenth century.
CIMSEC Blog
Piracy and Armed Robbery at Sea: book review
2016 •
Alex Calvo
From Hollywood films to some Chinese popular perceptions of their Eastern neighbors, piracy and pirates retain a powerful hold in contemporary culture. However, it is their most recent incarnation in areas like the Gulf of Guinea, the Malacca Straits, and the Horn of Africa, that is carefully followed by anybody involved in maritime affairs, from ship owners and operators to naval officers and international lawyers. Among other aspects of piracy, the legal regime of pirates and operations against them is of the foremost importance, and therefore any volume devoted to them deserves a careful look.
Women at the Helm: Rewriting Maritime History through Female Pirate Identity and Agency
2018 •
Wendy Vencel
The subject of Atlantic-based Golden Age (1650-1720) piracy has long been an area of historical and mythical fascination. The sea has historically been a realm outside the reaches of mainland society, where women could express any aspect of their personal identity. Women at the Helm: Rewriting Maritime History through Female Pirate Identity and Agency queers the history of Golden Age piracy while placing the colonial period’s seafaring women within a longer historical tradition of female maritime crime and power. Notable female pirates of this era, including Ireland’s Grace O’Malley and the Caribbean’s Anne Bonny and Mary Read, through the act of piracy and maritime crime transcended the traditional gender roles placed on women. Women at the Helm discusses how these maritime women gained agency and autonomy through the transcendence of gender and sexuality norms, as well as how women manipulated their social situations to establish power in a world seemingly run by men. This contrad...
Pirates on a Round-the-Atlantic-Tour ("Trans-Oceanic Cultural Commerce" International Colloquium by International Consortium for the Study of Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Reconciliation (ICSP-CRR), 26 March 2015)
Onur Alptekin
A Commentary on the Pirate Round and the relations between the State, the Pirate and the Ocean that was presented at International Colloquium on "Trans-Oceanic Cultural Commerce", 27-28 March 2015; by International Consortium for the Study of Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Reconciliation (ICSP-CRR) Colloquium: https://www.academia.edu/12382955/Trans-Oceanic_Cultural_Commerce_March_2015_ ICSP-CRR: https://nottingham.academia.edu/ICSPCRR
The RUSI Journal
Pirates, Drugs and Navies
2016 •
Jan Stockbruegger
New Seas - The Ideals of the Golden Age Pirate in the Information Age
Denis Y Boulet
Springer
Piracy at Sea
2013 •
Mali Zhou
The Pirate Myth: Genealogies of an Imperial Concept
Amedeo Policante
The image of the pirate is at once spectral and ubiquitous. It haunts the imagination of international legal scholars, diplomats and statesmen involved in the war on terror. It returns in the headlines of international newspapers as an untimely ‘security threat’. It materializes on the most provincial cinematic screen and the most acclaimed works of fiction. It casts its shadow over the liquid spatiality of the Net, where cyber-activists, file-sharers and a large part of the global youth are condemned as pirates, often embracing that definition with pride rather than resentment. Today, the pirate remains a powerful political icon, embodying at once the persistent nightmare of an anomic wilderness at the fringe of civilization, and the fantasy of a possible anarchic freedom beyond the rigid norms of the state and of the market. And yet, what are the origins of this persistent ‘pirate myth’ in the Western political imagination? Can we trace the historical trajectory that has charged this ambiguous figure with the emotional, political and imaginary tensions that continue to characterize it? What can we learn from the history of piracy and the ways in which it intertwines with the history of imperialism and international trade? Drawing on international law, political theory, and popular literature, The Pirate Myth offers an authoritative genealogy of this immortal political and cultural icon, showing that the history of piracy – the different ways in which pirates have been used, outlawed and suppressed by the major global powers, but also fantasized, imagined and romanticised by popular culture – can shed unexpected light on the different forms of violence that remain at the basis of our contemporary global order.
Pirates in Fact and Fiction
Louise Hitchco*ck
This is a 650 word post for the ASOR blog on pirates in fact and in fiction. It's a bit of fun!
Journal of World History
Pirates, Merchants, Settlers, and Slaves: Colonial America and the Indo-Atlantic World by Kevin P. Mcdonald
2016 •
Steven Pitt
