Research Catalog

The fish factory : work and meaning for Black and White fishermen of the American menhaden industry

Title: The fish factory : work and meaning for Black and White fishermen of the American menhaden industry / Barbara J. Garrity-Blake.
Author: Garrity-Blake, Barbara J., 1960-
Publication: Knoxville : University of Tennessee Press, ©1994.

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan How do I pick up this item and when will it be ready?	Text	Use in library	HD8039.F652 U624 1994	Off-site

Details

Description

xxiii, 160 pages : illustrations; 24 cm

Summary

Focusing on the menhaden fishermen of the southern coastal regions, The Fish Factory is an engaging and insightful exploration of what work means to different social groups employed within the same industry. Since the nineteenth century the menhaden industry in the South has been traditionally split between black crews and white captains. Using life histories, historical research, and anthropological fieldwork in Reedville, Virginia, and Beaufort, North Carolina, Barbara J. Garrity-Blake examines the relationship between these two groups and how the members of each have defined themselves in terms of their work. The author finds that for the captains and other white officers of the menhaden vessels - men "born and bred" for a life on the water - work is a key source of identity. Black crewmen, however, have insisted on a separation between work and self; they view their work primarily as a means of support rather than as an end in itself. In probing the implications of this contrast, Garrity-Blake describes captain/crew relations within both an occupational context and the context of race relations in the South. She shows how those at the bottom of the shipboard hierarchy have exercised a measure of influence in a relationship at once asymmetrical and mutually dependent. She also explores how each group has reacted to the advent of technology in their industry and, most recently, to the challenges posed by those proclaiming a conservationist ethic.

Subject

Genre/Form

History

Bibliography (note)

Includes bibliographical references (p. [149]-155) and index.

Contents

A history of the United States menhaden history -- Community life in southern fish factory towns -- Hierarchy and social relations -- Signs of the captain -- Songs of the crew -- The smell of pollution: factory processing and contemporary environmentalism -- The meaning of homplace and the value of land.

ISBN

0870498568
9780870498565

LCCN

94020340

OCLC

ocm30511390
30511390
SCSB-2046688

Owning Institutions

Princeton University Library