Oral Presentation Session

Reviewed by: Society for Cultural Anthropology

Of interest to: Practicing and Applied Anthropologists, Teachers of Anthropology in Community Colleges, Students

Primary Theme: Labor

Secondary Theme: The Political

(2-0605) From Port to Port (Part 2): Mobility, Labor, and Governance at Sea

Oceans have long been spaces of interconnection, allowing for the exchange of goods, people and ideas. Today, over 11 billion tons of goods are shipped across the world every year. The global shipping industry links producers to consumers, the maritime circulation of goods being central to the global economy. The movement of goods and the vessels that carry them is dependent on the development of port infrastructures, a flexible labor force (including port workers and seafarers), and regulations that allow the movement of certain goods and people, while restricting others.

This panel focuses on the labor practices and the regulatory regimes that make movement across vast oceanic spaces possible. What quotidian social practices allow seafarers to live an itinerant life at sea? How is this flexible, and often highly racialized labor force regulated? The shipping industry also relies on port infrastructures for the movement of goods. Yet, recent mega port projects have been highly contested, as ports become sites for the assertion of local, regional and global power. What are the national and international regulatory regimes that facilitate the movement of goods across borders and how is this regulation negotiated on-the-ground at port, and at sea?

Together, our papers show that ships and ports are crucial nodal sites for the movement of goods and people, and can be especially productive spaces to examine the infrastructures, labor practices, and regulatory regimes that are constitutive of the dynamics of capitalism.

Presenter(s)

• Sonia Das

  New York University

• Hafeez Jamali

  Balochistan Archives

• Adrienne Mannov

  Postdoc
  Aalborg University

• Julian Stenmanns

  Research Associate
  Department of Human Geography, Goethe University Frankfurt

Organizer(s)

• Nidhi Mahajan

  University of California Santa Cruz

Presenter(s)

• Nidhi Mahajan

  University of California Santa Cruz

Chair(s)

• Brenda Chalfin

  Director of African Studies and Professor of Anthropology
  University of Florida

Discussant(s)

• Brenda Chalfin

  Director of African Studies and Professor of Anthropology
  University of Florida

Presentations:

• 4:30 PM - 4:45 PM

  Maritime Language Polices and Infrastructures of Communication on Cargo Ships
  Sonia Das – New York University
• 4:45 PM - 5:00 PM

  Zones of Anxiety: Ports, Pipelines, and the Necro-politics of National Identity in Pakistan
  Hafeez Jamali – Balochistan Archives
• 5:00 PM - 5:15 PM

  Itinerant Sovereignty and the Global Maritime Supply Chain
  Adrienne Mannov – Aalborg University
• 5:15 PM - 5:30 PM

  Governing Mobility: Encountering the Viapolitics of Logistics
  Julian Stenmanns – Department of Human Geography, Goethe University Frankfurt
• 5:30 PM - 5:45 PM

  On Dhow Sailors and Dangers at Sea
  Nidhi Mahajan – University of California Santa Cruz
• 5:45 PM - 6:00 PM

  Discussion
  Brenda Chalfin – University of Florida