Subject:
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Re: Pirate dissertation
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.pirates
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Date:
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Mon, 22 Oct 2001 20:50:28 GMT
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Viewed:
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952 times
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G'day,
Being a lowly High Schooler (though they say an abnormally bright one :),
I'm a bit short when it comes to ideas for dissertations, but I can point
out one thing that might be of importance - your definition of 'pirate' is
going to have to fairly specific.
Back in the Age of Sail, whether you were a pirate or a 'privateer' often
depended solely on who was talking about you. For instance, Americans would
call the private ships that raided British Coastal shipping in 1812
'privateers' because they were officially sanctioned by the US government,
while the Admiralty refered to them as 'pirates'. Depending on where you
look, you'll get different accounts of what a pirate was, though I expect
there were some plain renegades who no one would classify 'privateer'.
Afraid I don't know too much about them.
As to the privateers, they were no more or less ruthless than the Navies of
the day -- depended on the ship, crew, and Captain. Generally they were in
it for the money. Aside from that, accounts I've read of French and US
privateers see them operate very much like Naval ships -- discipline, order,
etc... though they were often overcrewed and well-crewed.
Not sure if that helps at all...
Kenneth Tam
GA 826 Squadron
http://www.members.home.com/ga826squadron/Main.html
In lugnet.pirates, Magnus Lauglo writes:
> Hello,
>
> I hope it is OK to post this to this newsgroup, apologies for lack of any
> lego content. I'm hoping some pirate history buffs may be able to give me
> some pointers for my upcoming University dissertation.
>
> I am a third year history student, about to write my main dissertation on
> some social aspect of 1500 - 1800s era piracy. It is based on a course I
> have done on Law, Crime and Society in Early Modern England, and it would
> have to have a kind of social history perspective. Although I have always
> been interested in history in general, I don't know particularly much about
> piracy, it just seemed like it might make for an interesting topic (and the
> other topic I was "doing" for a while, didn't seem to be going anywhere).
>
> I have yet to decide exactly what I want to focus on, perhaps various
> portrayals of piracy by contemporaries, the government, folk literature, the
> pirates themselves, etc.
>
> Or possibly the social community of pirates; how aspects of uncommon
> democracy went hand in hand with ruthless violence. I might want to compare
> and contrast pirates with other sailors or other early modern era criminals
> (highwaymen, vagabonds), and see how they were portrayed or viewed differently.
>
> Any ideas or tips would be welcome. Are there any ideas as to which books
> would be best to start off with, both by modern historians and contemporary
> writers?
>
> I need to locate as much as possible primary source material from the period
> (ie ballads, reports of piracy, laws about piracy etc). Can anyone point me
> in the direction for this kind of thing? Just how much contemporary
> literature exists on piracy?
>
> Also, can anyone tell me if there are any good museums or exhibitions in the
> south of England that I might find useful to vist?
>
> Thanks
>
> Magnus
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Pirate dissertation
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| Hello, I hope it is OK to post this to this newsgroup, apologies for lack of any lego content. I'm hoping some pirate history buffs may be able to give me some pointers for my upcoming University dissertation. I am a third year history student, (...) (23 years ago, 22-Oct-01, to lugnet.pirates)
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