I think it’s a strength of the module that everyone has a unique perspective on how to do transnational history and this is evident in the sheer diversity of the projects presented. These presentations also gave me ideas on how to improve my own project going forward.
Here are a few comments I had about a couple of the presentations.
Poverty and Labour in the Jute Industry: Home and Away (Karen)
I thought this was a fantastic presentation, which clearly showcased the depth of your research. I also really liked the main factors of comparison which were clearly defined. After watching your presentation, I realised that this is something that my project is lacking, and I hope to implement some clear categories of comparison into my own project. Your historiography is clearly part of your project in your discussion of wages disparities and living conditions especially between the genders and locations. Perhaps a suggestion would be to briefly comment on the historiographical fields of social history, feminism or postcolonial studies. However, this is only a minor suggestion as the historiographical influences on your project are clear.
The Enlightenment: Connections between US and French Revolutions (Doug)
Another really good presentation which has been well thought out and has clear arguments outlined. The flow of ideas and their interactions is clearly a transnational in scope. You also showed that you had taken on board feedback in order to address the impacts that these revolutionary figures had on lesser-known actors. You also displayed a really good range of sources which were clearly split into a wide range of categories. Overall, this was a great presentation! Perhaps you could have maybe spoke a bit more of the lesser-known actors, however in a short 10-minute presentation there’s a lot to pack in so I wouldn’t worry too much about that!
Fist of Fury: A transnational guide on how Bruce Lee punched his way against Asian stereotypes in Hollywood (Naomi)
Again, another excellent presentation which transnationally spans beyond just Bruce Lee’s impact taking into account the Cold War political environment as well as how global definitions of masculinity developed and changed. I really liked your use of sources. Whilst most of them are not traditional academic sources they clearly support the argument you are making and its great see such a wide variety of sources being implemented into your project.
Here are my initial reactions to some of the presentations! I have only included four here, but I have watched them all and will gather my thoughts for what I am sure will be a great discussion in our final ( 🙁 ) class next Tuesday.
Hannah on the Refugee
I will try to answer the question you ask us in your presentation: what do you picture when I think of the word refugee? For me, you hit the nail on the head with the image of alone, worn out women, often with children; the picture of poverty. Also, I really liked how you brought in the negative media depiction of the refugee, as that is also something I definitely think about when I hear the word. I definitely don’t think I have seen any positive headings about refugees, though maybe that is because those don’t jump out as much as the negative ones with their punchy, natural disaster-like titles. This is indeed a very interesting analysis you present. I also really enjoyed your presentation of Ahmed’s cartoons, pointing out the lack of the neutral definition of the refugee. The transnational nature of your topic and its link to the movement of people is sure to provide some really interesting insights, and I am excited to read your final project!
Tanushree on Feminism
I found your presentation really enthralling, as coming from the British education system we studied exclusively British suffragettes/suffragists. As soon as you mentioned that the movement was not originating in the west and migrating outwards, but rhizomatic and globally erupting, it seemed like an obvious thought, but definitely one that I was unaware of. It will be great to read more into the intricacies of the relationship between the two movements in your final project. I also liked how you link to work on the fight against colonialism and how these processes/movements interacted, as general dissolution was increasing in the inter-war period. Again, the inter-connections pointed out between suffragettes and upper-caste women were really interesting, and provides another avenue for connections and comparisons, making this a true transnational study of the development and movements of Indian suffragettes!
Roger on Migrational Masala
I loved how you outlined the research gap straight from the beginning, adding a clear question to this already very well-thought out and well explained presentation! Transnational food history has definitely been something I haven’t thought about before this module, but your blog posts and presentations have been really insightful. One aspect of your presentation which I found super interesting was the link between the culture of convenience and spice blends, and how, perhaps, in Britain these families pay more care to preserving the spice mixes of their family, given the physical space between them. Your use of interviews will also be great, and really help to provide a study which hasn’t really been touched on before, so I look forward to reading your final project and discovering the real experiences behind spice blend consumption today, and how they are interconnected and differ.
Rory on Black Metal
Firstly, Rory, thank you for your comment’s on my presentation! I thought I would say that here as when I was watching your presentation I definitely found the similarities in our presentations and their focus on art really interesting. I must say, black metal is not something I have much (any!) experience with, but your presentation was clear and drew interesting parallels between music and politics which I never would have considered. I liked that you spoke about how music is not a self-contained human experience, but that it relates to everything- the political, social, cultural backdrop upon which it is produced and also consumed. This makes the music not a self-contained entity in itself, but, as you mentioned, there is a ‘micro-reflexity’ between the individual fan and their conception of the subculture. This is something which makes me think of how the people who watch the performances I study in my project are all experiencing something different, too, and so I am interested to read your final project!
Looking forward to seeing everyone again next week, here are a couple notes on each presentation.
Naomi
Really cool topic, “Asian masculinity in the Western gaze”, and your intonation during the presentation was so emotive that it both showed your own personal engagement with the topic while also encouraging me to do likewise. One question I had, just because I don’t think I got it clearly in the presentation, was about the difference between masculinity and the hyper-masculinity that is presented in traditional filmography, and outlining the differences between the two would help me understand more about what made Bruce Lee so ground-breaking. However, your analysis of race as well as gender showed his uniqueness enough without having to go into this gender question too specifically. The graphs were also really fun and visually engaging, so they worked well as springboard into other discussions on the topic. I also appreciated the focus on multiple forms of art, rather than being an essay on films you brought in video games and other media.
Roger
A very clinical and clear presentation, I am left in no doubt as to what you aim to achieve with your project. One thing I was slightly confused about was the choice of photos in each slide, while I think you explained them well in each case this usually came midway through the slide’s narration and so I was left questioning why an ant was on the screen for a few seconds. Another point, if using oral history, which clearly works well for this investigation, I think giving a rough time period as to when you believe the historical change under investigation took place would help us understand how useful oral history can be to this case. Overall, just a very cool project with fantastic political implications for the survival of cultural traditions.
Grace
I really liked how the secondary sources were organised by their political angles, really showing the emotive significance and political potential of any investigation on this topic. Equally, I enjoyed your exploration of each type of primary source that you will be using and your analysis as to each of their utilities. One question I was left with, simply because I am left interested by your presentation, is why this has to be a transnational history? Do ART practices differ on the transnational scale to the domestic scale? Is the difference one of national exploitation? You sold me on the topic and so that is why I am curious about such questions.
Hannah
The first few introductory slides were really effective, leaving us in no doubt as to the layout of the presentation. Your narration was flawless, and I only wish I could present as calmly and as communicatively digestible as you did here (I feel I’m rather too manic to be able to do this). Since you raise the political implications of the issue throughout your piece (that portrayals can’t be neutral; that there is a need for ethically informed decision-making; that we need to reorient the debate away from Europe), will your piece take any specific political positions? I also want to ask as to what extent art analysis will play a role in informing your project, considering you do it so convincingly throughout the presentation? I also enjoyed the multimedia aspect of the presentation. Finally, on discussing the creation of “the refugee”, I’m not sure whose construction of the identity you are trying to analyse, is it the construction of it by hegemonic media, by other people, by the artists critiquing this, or by the refugees themselves? Just not sure who the object for analysis is in this piece.
Angus
Really cool topic. One question I had, if there was a Welsh sub-altern that was highlighted in the 18th Century, when did this sub-altern cease to exist or change? I feel your comparative model, which shows great sensitivity to the issue of likening two differing sub-altern communities, offers a good methodological base to analyse this and allows you to bring in plenty of historiography which you may have otherwise been lacking had you focused purely on the Welsh sub-altern. I like how you define the Welsh sub-altern and I really look forward to hearing more on the topic. I wonder whether there is potential for the identification and revival of cultural traditions in this investigation?
Douglas
I enjoyed how clearly the introduction laid out the progression of the presentation, and your clear and calm narration throughout made each point more effective. I think you present the transnational nature of the topic convincingly, that these ideas offered connections to varying communities who interpreted them differently based upon their unique historical context. I also really like your methodological choice of focusing on lesser-known pieces, and I hope this will help you pinpoint precisely which discursive events proved the most significant in driving the actions surrounding these revolutions. Just to pedantically quibble on methodology though, while the choice of sources is identified, I’m not sure I quite picked up the aim, the final goal, of this analysis and I’m unsure whether to liken this method to Foucault or to the Cambridge School or to something else.
Morven
You present really interesting questions, ones similar to those raised by Clare Anderson’s piece on Jim Crow across the Anglophonic world which we read earlier in the term, and I think you present a really cool nuanced point on how these play adaptations offer a reflexivity in the master/servant dialectic which these plays are performed within. Your diffusionist methodology looks like it can effectively deconstruct Eurocentric perspectives on Shakespeare and diversify the narrative, showing that there are many different authentic interpretations of Shakespeare that exist outside of its original form; these being the recontextualisations to specific cultural coordinates. The in-depth analysis of the Omkara vs. Suzman’s Othello was brilliant, and I love the role which art plays in informing your analysis.
Karen
I like the “home and away” aspect of the piece, connecting two completely different communities which exist across the globe from one another, and how a specific market force can have such similar, and dissimilar, effects on each of them. It’s a well laid out piece with clearly spoken narration. The statistics are absolutely fascinating and shocking, and the role of migration is interesting because I wonder what transversal exchanges occurred as new rural migrants entering the city encountered the existing inhabitants, and similarly with different Indian communities coalescing in Bengal. Ultimately, I think your method and choice of primary sources can show us how these two global cities of Empire were created by the working people who lived hard lives around them. It would be interesting to hear some more about the secondary source historiographical discussions surrounding the lives of these people.
Carmen
I enjoy the refreshing focus on transcultural meetings without state borders and the look at the power of the state. It’s obviously an interesting subject, hence why you have so many questions surrounding it, but by narrowing the questions you wish to focus on we can get a lot more from each of these questions individually. You effectively narrated what you wanted to achieve with this piece, however, visual cues accompanying the slides discussing sources and a more explicitly laid out methodology and analysis of sources would make the presentation more interesting.
Tanushree
I enjoyed your analysis of the use of the term “feminism”, and I enjoy how you complicate and create a postcolonial account of the hegemonic British bourgeois notion of women’s liberation. By outlining that these liberation movements began on a national level before the transnational scope existed, you justify your analysis. The analysis of sources surrounding feminism and caste was great and I would have enjoyed hearing your analysis of some more secondary sources if there was more time in the presentation. I thought your critique of the methodology was great, however I would have liked to have heard more about what you will be applying as the methodological foundation of your piece more because of this. One final point, I thought the presentation was great and I think as a general project its really cool, but I wasn’t quite sure as to what your specific question for investigation was.
There we have it. I really enjoyed everyone’s piece because they’re all so interesting and everyone is clearly very engaged in what they’re writing about. The awkwardness of facing everyone after giving feedback definitely eases the sadness that comes with this being the final week of term!
I like how you laid out your questions at the start and followed with your historiography and how it relates to your questions.
You raised good points on asymmetrical comparisons and how it’s asymmetrical to make sure there isn’t any “competition” between comparing the two groups. Therefore, your justification is well made, and I appreciate that you understand there may be troubles in conducting an asymmetrical comparison as your methodology, yet it’s worth trying as there’s still a high chance of understanding similarities and differences between the two groups you’re trying to compare.
I also really like how you’re being creative in your primary sources such as using court documents and visitor accounts.
Keep up the good work!
Karen’s Presentation Comments
Hey Karen,
Your presentation was super great and informative! You made a super clear start and told us your methodology right at the beginning, which was comparison. Your topic is highly complex; therefore, you did a really great job in stating which three areas your project will focus on to keep a straight and concise thesis.
I really liked how concise you were with your facts and gave us all a thorough background of migration, wages and living costs, and working and living conditions in both Bengal and Dundee.
Your bibliography was superb, using both primary and secondary sources. However, I think from your presentation I would have liked to have seen how you used them in your findings so far. Besides this, it was a truly great presentation and highly informative!
Rory’s Presentation Comments
Hey Rory,
Really cool topic! I was immediately engaged to your presentation just by your presenter voice, it was super clear, and you enunciated very well (your title slide sounded like you were a pilot lol).
It’s very clear that you have done a lot of research already, and it was very noticeable when you talked about the author of the blog – it showed great engagement with your sources.
I think it would have been cool to see some examples of primary source analysis, for example, you said analysis of the art from Black Metal artists would be seen in your essay, but perhaps an example of how you would go about that would really enrich your presentation in my opinion.
Your engagement with historiography is great though, especially how you went through each type of study and stated some of their arguments.
Before embarking on my current exploration into transnational surrogacy and the use of Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART’s) more broadly, I had no real conception of the potential these technologies held. I knew that parents could select traits that desired their children to have, but this was only because I have personally encountered this trend. A couple I know have recently become the parents of a set of twins whose characteristics they had chosen (including their sex, eye color, height, etc.) prior to the implementation of their embryos into their biological mother using in vitro fertilization (IVF). Although hearing that this level of choice in offspring was alarming, I did not stop to consider all of the far-reaching effects this kind of technology can have. After doing some research, it seems that ART’s have the capability to create a dystopian reality in which babies are produced as a result of selective breeding based on socially constructed realities instead of scientific fact. Considering that I personally know about half a dozen people who were born using IVF (surely more that I am just not aware of), it seems strange that I am only now learning some of the significant negative effects this process can have on the women and children involved. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (2012), an infant born of IVF is two to four times more likely to have birth defects than a naturally conceived baby. This is absolutely shocking to me, for this seems like a very big risk to take, especially considering that there are so many children without birth defects who are desperately awaiting adoption. Furthermore, when IVF is talked about in the media and in informal social settings (in my experience), it seems that these significant risks are not discussed or even acknowledged. This points to the strength of the desire parents have to obtain children who are biologically related to them, and the social construction of biological-relatedness as an utmost priority. Furthermore, in the case that the eggs used in an IVF procedure are harvested from a separate female (other than the women who will carry the embryos to term), the egg donor must undergo hormonal stimulation, and the long-term implications of this process for women’s health is still unknown (Swerdlow and Chavkin, 2017). It seems preposterous that doctors and their associated clinics are allowed to market egg ‘donation’ to college students without first having an understanding of risk (Jordan, 2013). In the case of surrogacy, women who are implanted with embryos from a third-party, are at an increased risk of incurring gestational hypertension and preeclampsia (Klatsky et al., 2010). Finally, and what surprised me most, was that although research is still ongoing, there have been studies which show that the gestational environment has the potential to alter a fetuses epigenome (Swerdlow and Chavkin, 2017). I am not sure what shocks me most, that surrogates can have a genetic impact on the baby they give birth to, or that ART’s have been so widely used despite a lack of conclusive evidence in regard to its long-term effects. Clearly more research needs to be done before these technologies can be employed safely and ethically. It is preposterous that the transnational surrogacy, which completely depends on the use of ART, flourishes globally despite a lack of real data on the effect of these processes.
Bibliography
Jordan, Emily Rose, ‘An Awful Alternative to Work-Study’, Columbia Spectator, New York, 27 March 2013, <https://www.columbiaspectator.com/2006/11/20/awful-alternative-work-study/> [accessed 17 April 2021].
Klatsky PC, Delaney SS, Caughey AB, Tran ND, Schattman GL and Rosenwaks Z, ‘The role of embryonic origin in preeclampsia: a comparison of autologous in vitro fertilization and ovum donor pregnancies,’ Obstetrics & Gynecology 116: 6 (2010), pp. 1387–92.
Swerdlow, Laurel, and Wendy Chavkin, ‘Motherhood in Fragments: The Disaggregation of Biology of Care’, in Miranda Davies (ed), Babies For Sale? (London, 2017), pp. 19-32.
A particularly interesting aspect of my project has been looking at the American Revolution from a British perspective. It is an area that I was relatively unaware of before Rory’s comment on one of my earlier blog posts, but has now become a central aspect of my project. The Whiggish perspective, outside of the usual accounts of Thomas Paine, is a very complex and historically appealing area of study.
One book that was recommended to me, Robert Tombs’ The English and Their History, has made me ponder the question of why the curriculum is compiled in the manner that it is. Within the British education system, very little is generally taught on the subject of the American Revolution. On top of this, even less is mentioned about the Whiggish sympathies for the American case of independence, an area that, as I have mentioned, is worth its weight in gold when it comes to historical case studies. The complexities of teaching such a topic, whereby British parliamentarians and people felt that the agenda of the Crown and the State was flawed, are undoubtedly the reasoning behind their absence from the mainstream curriculum.
There is an interesting scene in The History Boys, whereby the discuss the morality of studying the Holocaust. Whilst I am not comparing the two, I am highlighting the fact that material that would be sensitive to those studying it is often left by the wayside and forgotten about, especially in mainstream education. A line from that scene states the need to “distance ourselves”, that “there is no period in history more distant than the recent past”. Whilst the American Revolution can no longer be called ‘recent history’, the consequences of British colonialism are very much recent, if not ongoing. Whilst this is very much beyond the limits of my project, it is something that is definitely worth exploring and was included in my dissertation proposal – fingers crossed it is approved!
I spent all of last week trying to look for primary sources. It was a bit of a hassle because some of the most important sources aren’t accessible to undergraduate students. However, I was able to look into some other essential ones such as old newspapers, speeches and British parliament papers. The important task now is to discern the important elements from the sources and corroborate it with my other research which has been drawn from secondary literature. It is way harder than I anticipated. I had dealt with primary sources before but it was assigned by the tutor and I knew exactly where and how to use it. Last week wasn’t really productive in terms of progress- at this point, I feel a bit stuck since I have done most of my research and I don’t how to put it all together. With the aid of the essay question I have always managed to structure my essays- but for this one, I am confused about what is relevant and what is not.
As I see some of the most prominent Indian academics being forced to resign from their positions at Indian universities for criticizing the government, I feel nervous and disillusioned. It makes me wonder what kind of an academic culture will I return to. The reason why I am bringing this up here is to discuss Maitrayee Chaudhuri’s article that highlighted the importance of Indian academia in correcting the narrative of the post-structuralists scholars in the west. Chaudhuri points that in the past few decades, non-western scholars in western institutions have had an amplified voice within the academic discourse. The post-colonial studies departments in western universities have flourished over the past years. However, she discusses “what post-colonial theory fails to recognize is that what counts as ‘marginal’ in relation to the west has often be central to the foundational in the non-west[1]” (p.20) She later on elaborated on this by discussing the complexity of the Indian feminism and the unique set of problems faced by Indian women. Such concepts have often been ignored by Indian academics in the west. While discussing the relation of women and imperialism they often overlook the nuances of intersectionality based on caste. Her allegation has been that departments of ‘subaltern studies’ situated in the west erased the history of lower-caste women. They only focused on the racial and gender dynamic while blaming everything on the epistemic violence of the west. As Tanika Sarakar has also mentioned before, one of the shortcomings of the ‘Siadian magic’ has been of overlooking the hegemonic structures that existed in India. While studying about the suffragists, and looking into the primary sources, one of the major things I noticed was the lack of mention of Dalit women. Almost like their voices didn’t exist. Because non-western academics start using the same conceptual framework that is used in west, they ended up writing a western history of the subaltern that was bereft of any analysis on power structures within the colonized societies. While analysing racial relations is important, it is equally important to keep in mind the inequality that persisted within India which had started long before the colonizers entered, and exists till today. This made me realise the importance of having a thriving Academia in India which can produce work on topics like imperialism which post-colonial studies have failed to produce despite having so much more funding and academic freedom. In today’s India it seems like there is not enough freedom to produce work that could challenge Hindu Brahmanical patriarchy which western academia has has also failed to address. Transnational history of imperialism and feminism is extremely complex and layered- it is important to keep in mind the ills of imperialism while it is equally important to study how the inequalities that existed in India also reflected on an international level.
[1] Chaudhuri, Maitrayee. (2019). Feminism in India: The Tale and its Telling.
Firstly, I want to apologise for the alliterative title. Sometimes, I just can’t resist those basic linguistic turns that we were taught about oh so long ago, in primary school.
Secondly, please forgive me if this sounds too like Douglas’ most recent post. The ideas had been brewing before hand, I just hadn’t quite managed to get them down on paper yet. (or, more realistically, “on screen” [is that the suitable alternative to paper?]) Let’s say this could be posited as my own response to Douglas’ blog post, where he talks about his brain entering “transnational mode”.
I have to agree, and say that I’ve found exactly the same. Be it in my other module – Russia – Real and Imagined: Ideas, Identity and Culture, or just in general life, I’ve found that I’ve become attuned to seeing the “transnational” where before I would have glossed over these possible connections.
It’s become somewhat of a routine for me to bake at weekends. Over the last semester, I’ve looked forward to spending some down time away from the readings and my laptop, and creating something edible. Often, I’ve given the product away, to bless a local family. But all this baking, as well as my re-discovered love for the TV series, Masterchef Australia, has really lit a flame when it comes to conversations and connections about food.
Like Roger, I find myself fascinated by food history. How is it, that one day someone decided to whisk egg whites, and add some sugar, and create something called meringue? What about, the initial creation of alcohol? Was that really just someone who tried to make bread, and it went a bit wrong or they left it too long, and then decided to drink the fermented yeast-y liquid?
Throughout Roger’s blog posts, and the latest, “Transnational Tuber” is no different, he has spoken about the special nature of food, and the development of family recipes. Mostly, this is evident in how he talks about the unique blends of spices that form “garam masala” – a blend that is held close to the chest of family members, and yet treasured through many generations. These connections, the way cuisines have travelled (authentically, at least, rather than the street-corner-knock-off attempts), are just one of the many ways in which our world is connected. Perhaps, if I’d have been truly in the “food business” at the beginning of the semester, I would have chosen my project topic around the history of tea – but I fear that opens too many cans of worms that I wouldn’t be able to control them all.
In my latest piece of coursework for my Russian module, I’ve been looking at the influence of Russian émigré literature on Western perceptions – and I can’t escape the transnational. It also feels, at times, as if I’m reading with a dual purpose – because these people were also some of the first 20th century refugees. I really shouldn’t be surprised by now…but everything is quite remarkably, interconnected.
I’ll end with this – I’m so thankful that I stuck with my gut and chose MO3351 when my original module was cancelled last semester. It may have looked like an immense challenge (and, I’m not going to argue that it isn’t), but the practices I’ve learned so far (and I’m not even finished yet) have changed the way I study and read history, and changed it for the better.
We often talk about “lenses” when it comes to historiographical approaches. In this case, MO3351 has successfully placed a filter over my reading glasses, helping to identify connections, and informing my analysis of material. In such an interconnected world, this can only be a good thing.
In the blogs this week a few have commented on the way this module has demonstrated that there are connections everywhere. I am in total agreement! My other module this semester is on The Medieval Castle and we have done readings and research about castles all over the world. One thing that has caught my interest is the idea of trends and influences that have moved from one area to another, for example from the east to the west or vice versa. Although, we have not gone into this in great detail, it has intrigued me and is something I would like to know more about. Like the others have said I am also starting to see more and more connections, whilst reading and researching in other modules and even within my working life.
One last push
As the semester is drawing to a close and it has got to that time where deadlines are very tight, there is a distinct one last push to have everything completed. It has been hard at times trying to study, work and home-school etc, all at the same time, but we are nearly there. One thing that this semester has taught me is that whether I get an 11, 13, 15 or whatever mark it maybe, it is an accomplishment in itself for anyone to be able to complete and pass modules in the face of extreme pressures and circumstances brought on by a worldwide pandemic. It has been a privilege to get to know everyone in the class, even if it is only online, rather than in person and I wish everyone the best of luck in the future.
While writing my short essay on Mapuche militarization as a response to the Chilean State and Chilean society ignoring the day-to-day reality of the Mapuche in Chile I learned of the pervasiveness that the neoliberal policies had on them. As a result I decided to change my project topic from the Catholic Church in Chile’s relationship with the Mapuche to the Chilean State’s subjugation of the Mapuche through their neoliberal policies and their weak and ironic ‘Growth with Equity’ policy. Through my research it became clear that these policies are at the heart of the ‘Mapuche conflict’ and has what kept the Chilean government from ever truly helping the Mapuche and listening to their demands.
The radical neoliberal policies in Chile not only commodify all natural resources but also individuals. Alejandro Foxley, the chief architect of the ‘Growth with Equity’ campaign during the Concertacion years, famously reflected on the neoliberal policies, ‘we have already paid the social costs of these neoliberal policies, so we might as well enjoy the economic benefits.’ This quote is what drove me to change my project topic. For the Minister of Finance to admit that the neoliberal policies cause great social costs that benefit only a few was jarring. One of the greatest reasons Mapuche demands are not being met is because of the Chilean State’s economic interests in the south of Chile— the forestry estates. Moreover, the individualism that neoliberalism breeds leaves the Mapuche to ‘help themselves’ and leaves them with the option to either become a capitalistic ‘credit-card citizen’ like the rest of the country or in their current repressed and ignored state. The option is to assimilate or continue in their current state of ‘invisibility.’
This project will also greatly aid me as I look to write my dissertation next year. I will be (hopefully) writing about neocolonialism in Chile through the mining industry and will be focusing on economic history. By delving into some of the material now I hope it will help in contextualizing and understanding the topic further.
The topic for this blog post fits rather well with last week’s seminar topic of the non-human, or ‘more-than human’: sea-life. While our class focused on non-animal environmental forces, I thought it could be interesting to do some research into another area of the non-human and write a blog post on that topic. Given our current climate emergency, a topic touched on in class and given as a possible reason for the surge in non-human historical study in recent years, I believe strongly in our commitment to protecting our planet.
After watching Netflix’s Seaspiracy, my eyes were opened to the transnational nature of global fishing. It seems an obvious fact that fish are transnational creatures and the fishing industry a transnational practise, but it was something I had not given much thought to prior to sitting down to watch this. This new ability to recognise transnational links is something touched on by both Naomi and Douglas in their blog posts this week, and is a very valuable new skill.
A 2010 study revealed that an estimated 44.9 people in 2008 were directly engaged in the fishing industry, with 85.5 per cent of these being in Asia, and 9.3 per cent in Africa.[1] Not only is much of the fish we consume in Britain sourced globally, but there are many complex social and political contexts we can delve into when picking out a point in the supply chain. Putting these links in an environmental context, we are shown that the current situation is not sustainable, and the seas will eventually run out of fish.
While individuals can differ on the importance of animal rights, the documentary also shows us the dark side of fishing’s infringement on human rights; something we should all be concerned about. The modern slavery involved in fishing industry was something I was unaware of, but that plays an integral role in the capturing of fish consumed worldwide. When researching more on this topic, I found a report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime entitled ‘Transnational Organised Crime in the Fishing Industry’, which uncovered some eye-opening facts. The prevalence of fishers trafficked for forced labour was unveiled, as fishers were cruelly imprisoned on fishing vessels, often suffering sever physical and sexual abuse, and general lack of acceptable safety and working conditions. They found that the transnational nature of the fishing industry, as well as the legitimate presence of vessels at sea, was the main contributor to the opportunity for the industry to be a cover for criminal activities such as drug trafficking. [2]
Importantly, the UN’s study was explicit in stating that its aim was not to “tarnish the fishing industry”.[3] Their goal was to uncover whether there were criminal activities taking place within the transnational fishing industry. Here we see where Seaspriacy falls, and where transnational history faces challenges too. In the west we are benefitting from this slavery, yet we are damning it as inhumane and disgraceful. It is fine to study transnational history, but to critique and bash from the west perpetuates the kind of history we are trying to rid ourselves off in endeavouring to study a more nuanced and transnational history. What’s more is that the documentary hails practises such as dolphin culling in Taiji in Japan as abhorrent. This practise is used by the communities as a way to rid the seas of competing predators of fish, thus allowing them to catch more themselves. But we are a primary consumer of the tuna which is caught by these fisheries, the production of which we cannot stand to face. We are thus a primary producer of the fishing garbage which makes up 40% of the great pacific garbage patch. Our beaches are (relatively) clean in comparison, but we do not have a leg to stand on to critique.
To sum up, the message of the documentary is clear; eat less fish or we risk killing ourselves. But problematic is the message that in the west we are the pristine consumers, separate from the disgrace of the east Asian fishing industry. The documentary creator, though his message and love for our oceans comes from the right place, I believe, is a British white male in his 20s, who reduces the evil in the fishing industry to a simple narrative; that fishing is the problem. He assumes that the simple solution of ceasing to eat fish will solve our problem, without considering the history, culture, and politics involved in the profoundly transnational industry. The documentary pulled people in, myself included, but if we scratch the surface we see the problematic nature of white saviour and ‘other’ demon. So, while I’m not entirely sure this is a transnational history per se, I did think it an interesting topic to pose, and one which, perhaps had I not been studying this module, I likely would have completely missed. The ability to recognise and consider transnational links thus benefits my everyday life in more ways than perhaps thought!
As the module approaches the finish line, I’m genuinely surprised to see how fast time has gone (and how many clichés I can spew out of my mouth and into my writing). But seriously, time has flown, and I enjoyed every second of this module. Although disappointed there was no in-person classes at all, I’m glad I was still able to forge connections through this class and was able to have some resemblance of normalcy (even though the unconference was virtual, I still enjoyed it a lot!)
This module adapted my thinking, and like Douglas said in his blog post, I too am able to see un-forced connections when doing my readings, or even in real life. More than this, this module has allowed me to be creative, in an otherwise rigid university degree structure. I’m so glad I got the opportunity to explore Hong Kong history and culture through a transnational lens. I would love to focus on transnational history more (possibly in my dissertation) when it comes to Hong Kong.
I hope next year’s class will enjoy this module as much as I did!
As we come towards the end for the semester, it seems to have all gone by very, very quickly! It doesn’t seem long ago at all when I had barely even heard of transnational history, let alone where I am now, wading through the heavy historiographical waters surrounding the intricacies of the field.
Nonetheless, it has been an interesting and compelling journey up to this point that will definitely have a long-lasting impact on my historical studies. My brain has switched to a ‘transnational’ mode, wherein every text I read towards my project is viewed through the lens of potential (not forced!) connections, comparisons and entanglements. I think it is much more productive for me, carrying out a comparative history, to view the information I read instantly in this format, rather than as a last minute panic to find some sort of link between events. The odd thing is that, it is not only within MO3351 that I find myself thinking like this, but in my other work as well. Understanding the causations and consequences between parties, nations, individuals and events is truly a very rewarding and refreshing way to view history.
Of course, I will be the first to admit that I will not miss getting my head around some of the complex and theoretical arguments made in some of the texts I have looked at. However, there is again something refreshing about the openness of definitions within transnational history. My other module, on early modern warfare, whilst perfectly enjoyable in its own right, whilst open to historical interpretation, has very strict limits and boundaries that do not allow for individual experimentation. The debate regarding the line between global and world history, for example, is a much more freeing and dynamic way of thinking that undoubtedly delivers conclusions that would otherwise be impossible.
Just my musings at this stage as we work towards the end of the project…
The Sweet Potato is a versatile, nutritious and if cooked properly, delicious root. Whether it’s in fry form, steamed form, or roasted form, we see this humble tuber across multiple cultures and states across the globe. Although the roots of the sweet potato trace its origins back to Meso and South America, it travelled thousands of kilometres in eras before these distances were easily traversed. This little blog post today will explore the travels of the Sweet Potato, and its role in war, and the curiosities of how it is consumed across different cultures today.
Please be warned that this week’s post includes references to the genetic study of plants and to a certain degree Archaeobiology. In a bid to shift my focus to the non-human aspect of history, we will be treating the humble Sweet Potat as the main analytical unit of inquiry.
Archaeobiology what now?
The Sweet Potato, scientific name (Ipomoea Batatas), is a tuber (underground root) that is closely related to the morning glory. Eaten roasted, chipped, fried, stewed, ice creamed, curried and even in leaf form, the consumption of this plant is seen almost on every continent throughout the world. This curiously transnational tuber is significant across a range of cultures, with some touting its health benefits, and others using it as a staple in times of war. The origins of the sweet potato are murky. Dating back to nearly 5000 years ago, it was thought to have originated in Central or South America and was somehow spread to the Polynesian Islands. Most Archeaobiologist has referred to this gradual process of consumption and cultivation as “domestication”, and noted that Mesoamerica had the greatest diversity of Sweet Potato genomes.
The struggle with investigating this tuber comes in two parts. Firstly, it’s old. Very very old. Secondly, much of its history rests in areas that are grossly understudied in the discipline of history. Although the Mesoamerican and South American civilisations such as the Aztecs or Incans are introduced to elementary or middle school students as a sort of novelty, very little “serious” research has been done in this field. Similarly, the disparate and migratory nature of Polynesian civilisations (a gross oversimplification), makes it difficult for historians to find a suitable analytical standpoint from which to start. As a result, literature on the Sweet Potato is left to the niche of Archaeobiology.
The Travelling Tuber
According to Francisco J. Morales, a specialist in Plant Virology (of all things), wrote in the Agricultural Journal Geneflow. He points to the incongruity between how the Polynesian Islands were thought to be colonised by South-East Asian migrants, and the strong archaeological presence of the Sweet Potato on Palliser, Mangareva and Easter Islands (Rapa Nui). Most notably, the Easter Islands had an entire agricultural civilisation built on the Sweet Potato before its total agro-ecological collapse. The possible linguistic link between the name Polynesian name for Sweet potato, Kumara and the Central American name Kumar, points at the possibility of migration outwards from South America, but even here the evidence is far from concrete.
Once again, Archaeobiology rears its ornate head, and we see overlapping routes of exchange both linguistically, and genetically. The map above explores the possible routes that the sweet potato may have taken in its travels across the pacific. But with these perplexing travels aside. We can look at the cultural differences in how this particular tuber is consumed.
Taken from Historical collections reveal patterns of diffusion of sweet potato in Oceania obscured by modern plant movements and recombination, PNAS 2013
The Tuber in War and Peace
The Cantonese saying “mo faan sik, sik faan shue”, or “If there is no rice, eat sweet potato“, rings true in several East Asian countries in the aftermath of WWII. Conventional historical evidence points to the post-war US-occupied Japan. Where food production had dropped by nearly a quarter. Okumura Ayo, a Japanese food scholar, notes that from 1944 large swathes of rural Japan were turned towards cultivating sweet potato and that every part of the plant was eaten. This academic account is corroborated by accounts of a close Japanese family friend that to this day, remembers the harshness of rationing and the copious amounts of sweet potato as a staple. This was despite living in a relatively rural part of the country, Gifu, which was an agricultural area.
Taiwan, also saw an enormous amount of sweet potato production before, during and after the post-WWII period, producing 3.7% of the worlds total sweet potato crop. On a personal level, my Grandmother to this day avoids eating sweet potatoes. As it reminds her of rationing during WWII in Taiwan as well. It is curious to see the consistencies in the use of sweet potato as a rationing staple across East Asia.
The Modern Tuber
Most people here in the UK would know sweet potatoes in the form of fries, and it is indeed seen as a healthier and sometimes less tasty alternative to the common potato. The connotation of health that the sweet potato belies in most of the Western world resulted in it being consumed amongst athletes and the health-conscious. With a low glycemic index (meaning it is more slowly digested) it is recommended as a healthy carbohydrate. However, the history of sweet potato as a health food is only a recent development.
In modern-day Japan, sweet potato is sold by street vendors and out of trucks in the winter, with a characteristic Yakiiiimoooo, Ishiyakimooo, Yakiiiimooo (焼き芋ー、石焼きも、焼き芋ー) jingle, meaning “Roasted Sweet potato, rock roasted sweet potato!”. Not unlike the twinkling sounds of an ice cream truck in an American neighbourhood. These sweet potatoes are frozen to drive out the moisture from its cells, resulting in concentrated sugar levels. Creating a food as sweet and rich (and more nutritious) as ice cream. It is probably fair to say that the Japanese cultural equivalent of the American Ice cream truck are these Sweet potato trucks that ply their trade in the cold winters.
In Taiwan, we see an even stranger development. The tuber itself is often incorporated in rice porridge, and the leaves are commonplace in Taiwanese cooking. I distinctly recall having to explain to visiting German friends that what they were eating was Süßkartoffelblatt, and them remarking that they didn’t know that the leaf portion was edible. 蕃薯葉 in Taiwan is something of a unique vegetable that thus far, I have not found anywhere else.
This little historical journey the transnational tuber has taken across the globe is a remarkable one, and the variance in consumption across the globe fascinating. Thus, I have decided to have sweet potato for dinner, tomorrow night.
I spent the spring break researching for my project, and I found some interesting readings that helped me add some nuance to some of the ideas that I had already formed. I got in touch with Dr Rosalind Parr, who recommended Mrinalini Sinha’s ‘Specters of Mother India: the global restructuring of an empire’. This was an interesting read as it covered some significant elements that are often overlooked in post-colonial historiography. In all that I have read so far on my topic, I noticed an imbalance. The texts either focus on the role of Indian women in isolation with the imperial internationalism of the interwar period, or there is too much emphasis on other international institutions and lack of focus on the role played by subaltern women. Barring two or three readings, at least this is what I have observed so far. ‘Specters of Mother India’ was a satisfying read for me. It explored an exciting transition in the relationship between nationalism and women whilst being placed in an international context.
Mrinalini Sinha, in this book, demonstrated the importance of studying race and gender together in an analytical framework while reminding the readers of the growing agency of Indian women. US Journalist Katherine Mayo in 1925 wrote a polemic against the extension of political power to Indians. The book titled Mother India was supposed to expose the treatment of Indian women by Indian men. Her pro-imperial propaganda ended up becoming a catalyst in reinvigorating the nationalist project in India. A new discourse on Indian feminism emerged out of her rhetorical text[1]. Mayo’s writing evoked a global response; the book was translated into various languages. Gaining notoriety in the liberal feminist circles of America, her rhetoric called for an Anglo-US alliance in the post-war world that defied self-rule for colonies such as India. Mayo’s sinister writing ostensibly used the women’s question to further imperial propaganda and deny nationalists’ political demands in India. Mayo argued that Hinduism’s regressive practices led to the oppression of Indian women, which culminated in the depiction of Indian women as victims. When the question of women and children came up, the league of nations also got involved as it resonated with their plan. The post-suffrage organizations started giving into ideas of the white woman’s burden- the plight of women in colonies become a part of white women’s feminist agenda.
Mrinalini Sinha discusses how Indian women delegitimized the civilizing claims of the imperial government by repudiating Mayo’s text and creating a unique place for themselves in the International forum. Indian women challenged the validity of colonial rule by espousing liberal ideals and fighting for social reform. This explains how Subaltern women were able to play a unique role as nationalists and social reformers in the international platform. By furthering ideas of social reform, they contested imperial claims that tried to depict Indian women as oppressed victims. There is, of course, a caveat to this, Mayo’s claims were not plucked from thin air- there was some truth to it. Sinha also later asserts that the Indian women’s organization mainly comprised upper-caste women who were not representative of most Indian women. Some scholars have critiqued interwar internationalism as a façade that existed only to Brahmanise India[2].
Next, I read a few chapters from Rosalind Parr’s book ‘Citizens of Everywhere’. According to Parr, a distinct cosmopolitan nationalism led by women underpinned the processes of decolonization. The general depiction of Indian nationalism has undermined women’s agency and shown them as playing supporting symbolic roles. Popular culture has always depicted nationalist leaders such as Gandhi being in favour of women’s emancipation[3]. However, such narratives have overshadowed women’s independent contributions that go beyond Gandhi’s support for them. Partha Chatterjee’s work on women and nationalism has also been held guilty for downplaying the role of Indian women during the national struggle. His theory suggested that Indian women became a part of an inner/spiritual domain where they tried to establish themselves as different but modern. Therefore, Chatterjee claimed that the only role Indian women had during nationalism was to define themselves as different to the west. Thus, according to him, the cultural nationalist construction of women included limited emancipation of women. Scholars in the same school of thought as Chatterjee have attached little importance to women’s organised activism in the public sphere. Parr has reiterated that anti-colonial women were not passive subordinates in a dominant narrative. They bought their distinct perspectives and ideas to transnational dialogues about various issues. They cooperated internationally and shaped not only their histories but also the histories of the world[4].
[1]rivedi, Lisa. Review of Specters of Mother India: The Global Restructuring of an Empire. Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History 8, no. 1 (2007)
[2]Sinha, Mrinalini. “Refashioning Mother India: Feminism and Nationalism in Late-Colonial India.” Feminist Studies 26, no. 3 (2000): 623-44
[3]Rosalind Parr, Citizens of Everywhere. Indian Women, Cosmopolitanism, and Nationalism, 1920s-1950s. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming).
[4]Sinha, Mrinalini. “Refashioning Mother India: Feminism and Nationalism in Late-Colonial India.” Feminist Studies 26, no. 3 (2000): 623-44
