Category: Uncategorised

Keeping the Seas Free: New MSc in Maritime Security

The world’s first MSc in Maritime Security has been launched by the University of Greenwich. The course is designed to help the expanding international shipping industry tackle threats such as piracy and terrorism on the high seas. It will also deal with new issues affecting environmental and energy security, and aims to equip graduates, security personnel, serving and former members of the armed services with the professional skills they need to succeed in senior management roles in this growing professional sector.

The university’s Greenwich Maritime Institute (GMI) has teamed up with its School of Engineering and Natural Resources Institute (NRI), with Marine Insurance and Maritime Crime Consultants and with the Security Association for the Maritime Industry (SAMI), to develop the course. It draws on the institute’s established strengths in maritime management, policy and history as well as the university’s wider expertise in engineering, technology, energy, environmental science and the Law of the Sea.

SAMI, which provides an independent regulatory forum for the maritime security industry, has contributed its professional knowledge of the sector.

The career development opportunities offered by this new qualification are expected to attract interest from people currently working, or seeking employment, in senior roles in the armed services, the private maritime and shipping sector, private security firms, government bodies and law enforcement agencies.

Students can start this September, studying full-time for one year, or part-time over two years. They will be based in the historic setting of the university’s campus in the Old Royal Naval College, within the Maritime Greenwich World Heritage Site, at the heart of the nation’s naval and maritime seafaring traditions.

Professor Chris Bellamy, Director of the Greenwich Maritime Institute (GMI), says: “The whole planet depends on safe, secure shipping. By volume, up to 90 percent of international trade is carried by sea. Yet our oceans, which cover 70 per cent of the planet, can be dangerous places and there are incre

asing threats to this multi-trillion pound business.

“Almost every day we hear about issues such as pirates in the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Guinea and the Malacca Strait; port security, not to mention the melting Arctic, rising sea levels, maritime oil and gas, wind and tidal issues. The maritime industry needs educated people with the informed vision to deal with these threats and opportunities. This course can help to provide the professional development which is so vitally needed.”

SAMI Founder, Peter Cook, adds: “The maritime security industry has come a long way in stressing its professional credentials. The creation of this Masters degree is yet another stage in this development and we would encourage all those considering a career in the highest echelons of this rapidly growing industry to join this course.”

To find out more: http://www2.gre.ac.uk/study/courses/pg/mar/maritime-security,-msc

The Security Association for the Maritime Industry (SAMI)

SAMI provides an independent regulatory trade association for the maritime security industry and a focal point for global maritime security matters. Its membership is made up of over 100 maritime security providers from around the globe as well as equipment, technology and hardware providers exploring technical security solutions.

For a full list of SAMI members and more information about the Association and its work visit: www.seasecurity.org

Lifting of the Cutty Sark

Restoration work on the Cutty Sark, a 19th Century tea clipper, following a devastating fire, is nearing completion.

It is time for engineers to lift the 900-tonne vessel into its final position ahead of its reopening to the public in spring 2012.

The full story of the conservation project in Cutty Sark: National Treasure was shown on Friday 3 February on BBC Two, and is now available to view on the BBC iPlayer.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-16842625

University of Greenwich leads €4.6 million project to help regenerate fishing communities

Researchers at the University of Greenwich are leading a €4.6 million project helping to regenerate coastal fishing communities on both sides of the English Channel and the southern North Sea.

Focussing on towns and villages with traditional small scale fishing fleets, they will look at the ways local inshore fishing contributes to the identity of places and their communities, as well as seeking new sustainable opportunities to boost regeneration and economic growth.

The University of Greenwich team is headed by environmental geographers Dr Tim Acott and Dr Julie Urquhart, from the School of Science and social scientist Dr Minghua Zhao from the Greenwich Maritime Institute. They joined forces with research colleagues in France and Flanders to secure co-funding from the European Interreg IVa 2 Seas programme for the three-year project, Geography of Inshore Fishing and Sustainability.

Dr Urquhart says: “Inshore marine fishing is at the heart of so many places, whether they have just a few small fishing boats pulled up on a shingle beach or a harbour that is the centre of activity for a larger fishing fleet.

“You cannot think about places like Whitstable, Brixham or Newlyn without recalling fishing and local seafood. Inshore marine fishing is central to their identity as communities and places.”

The project was one of just 12 successful bids out of a total of 49 applications to the most recent European Regional Development Fund 2 Seas cross-border programme.

Project leader Dr Acott says: “We will be building on valuable research we have already been doing in fishing communities.

“Working with researchers in France and Flanders gives us a cross-cultural perspective and opportunities to share ideas and solutions to common problems – not least how the sense of identity within fishing communities can make a significant contribution to regeneration and sustainable economic growth.

“Our findings will help to provide the information people need to develop new activities on the ground to regenerate their communities and feed into policy decisions which will ensure a sustainable future. We are hoping to help to create a sense of shared identity in fishing places across the region.”

Plans include photographic exhibitions exploring life in fishing communities and a demonstration project of fishing heritage-led regeneration at the fishing village of Arnemuiden, in The Netherlands.

For further information contact Project Manager, Suzanne Louail. s.louail@gre.ac.uk

GMI MPhil/PhD Studentship

Women’s Contribution to Social Cohesion in Coastal Communities

University of Greenwich – Greenwich Maritime Institute

Ref: PGRO-GMI-2-11

Greenwich Maritime Institute, Greenwich, London

Greenwich Maritime Institute is pleased to offer one externally funded MPhil/PhD Studentship as part of the Interreg 4a 2 Seas project GIFS (Geography of Inshore Fishing and Sustainability). The GIFS project will explore the socio-economic and cultural importance of inshore fishing including governance, economic regeneration and the cultural value of fishing, and provides an opportunity for the successful candidate to be part of a cross-border inter-disciplinary research team. The research topic will relate specifically to women’s contribution to social cohesion in coastal communities in four European countries: Belgium, Britain, France and the Netherlands and the investigation will focus on these dimensions: (1) Women’s employment, income, health and education; (2) Women’s perception and feelings of safety, security and freedom; (3) Women’s access to and construction of networks amongst themselves and with others; (4) Women’s participation in main stream institutions

The successful candidate will be working as part of the cross-border GIFS project team and will be expected to travel and participate in fieldwork, project activities and meetings in the above noted four countries.

The successful candidate will receive a £13590 per annum bursary plus a contribution of up to £4000 per annum towards the tuition fees during the term of the studentship (three years), subject to satisfactory performance. An additional £2,000 per annum will also be available for fieldwork expenses.

Applicants must hold a 1st Class or Upper 2nd class Honours Bachelor’s or Master’s degree (UK or UK equivalent) in a relevant discipline for example geography, history, woman’s studies, environmental studies, political science, sociology or anthropology. Applicants should have previous experience of undertaking research, preferably in gender studies, and ideally experience of fisheries related to European counties. Excellence in English speaking and writing is essential, preferably also with an ability to speak fluent French or Dutch.

For further information please contact: Dr Minghua Zhao, M.Zhao@gre.ac.uk, Tel: 020 8331 7661

For additional information about the studentship and links to the application form please go to:http://www2.gre.ac.uk/research/study/studentships 

The application form should be completed and returned to: postgraduateresearch@gre.ac.uk  and include: an attached pdf file of a comprehensive CV and a one page covering letter explaining your interest in the project and how it relates to past experience and present motivations.

The closing date for applications is noon on 31 January 2012.

Christmas Past

British Pathe have a lovely range of newsreels showing Christmas times in the Navy from 1914 to the 1940s – which mostly seem to consist of making Christmas puddings and drinking rum.  To view a few of them click on the following links:

Naval Barracks aka Christmas Dinner and Rum in the Navy (British Pathe, 1914)

Naval Christmas Devonport (British Pathe, 1919)

Christmas in the Navy HMS Hood (British Pathe, 1922)

Christmas with the Navy (British Pathe, 1940)

Xmas aboard a Cruiser (British Pathe, 1940)

Show your support for ‘The Gin Lane Gazette’!

Friend of the GMI, Adrian Teal is writing an illustrating an historical romp called ‘The Gin Lane Gazette; and you can help get it published.

Details of his work are shown on the Unbound website which is a new way of connecting with writers. http://www.unbound.co.uk/books/22 Unbound allows you to listen to the ideas of authors and if you like their idea, you can pledge to support it. If they hit the target number of supporters, the author can go ahead and start writing.
There are several levels of support, each with different rewards. The higher your pledge, the greater the rewards you’ll receive, from your name in the back of the book to lunch with the author.
As soon as you make a pledge to support an Unbound project you gain access to the author’s private area or ‘shed’. Here you can get updates on the book’s progress, watch exclusive interviews, read draft chapters, find out information about the author’s backlist and join discussions with the author and other supporters. It’s a portal into a new community of writers and readers: a place to comment on and contribute to a work in progress.

The GIN LANE GAZETTE will be a compendium of illustrated ‘best bits’ from a fictional newspaper of the latter 1700s. It will contain some of the most sensational headlines and true stories of the period. The presses will be presided over by inky-fingered hack Mr. Nathaniel Crowquill, the editor and proprietor, whose premises are located in Hogarth’s chaotic Gin Lane, and who has devoted fifty years to sniffing out scandal and intrigue. His drunken acolyte, Mr. Jakes, supplies merciless caricatures and engravings for every page. Sports reports, obituaries, fashion news, courtesans of the month, book reviews, and advertisements for bizarre – and often alarming – goods, services and entertainments will also feature in a riotous mélange of metropolitan mayhem.

Adrian has spent fifteen years producing cartoons for clients such as the Sunday Telegraph, History Today and QI, and hopes to give you an authentic flavour of the exuberance, debauchery, bravery, inventiveness, and eccentricity which characterise the Georgian world.

Please support him!

Journal for Maritime Research: New Articles by GMI Staff

GMI Visiting Lecturers Victoria Carolan and James Davey both have articles in the new issue of  the  Journal for Maritime Research Volume 13, Issue 2, 2011 which are now available online.  For a taster here are the abstracts:

Victoria Carolan, ‘The Shipping Forecast and British National Identity’

This article looks at the cultural impact of the shipping forecast issued by the Meteorological Office on behalf of the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. It has a strange status that is unprecedented for a weather bulletin. The forecast has become engrained as a part of British culture and as a signifier of Englishness. This distinction of British and English is deliberate; this article will suggest that while the forecast covers the whole of the United Kingdom, and has an aesthetic resonance that extends nationwide, the characteristics and opinions that it has been used to represent appear to have been made specifically in respect of Englishness.

The article considers reactions to the change of the sea area named Finisterre before looking at the artistic uses of the forecast. It argues that the cultural importance of the forecast has increased at the same time as its functional, informative role has become virtually redundant. Reactions to the forecast from the 1980s onwards have tended to reflect a crisis in English national identity, jostling for position in the ‘new Europe’ and re-evaluating itself at home in light of the establishment of the Scottish parliament and the national assemblies in Wales and Northern Ireland at the end of the 1990s.

James Davey , ‘The advancement of nautical knowledge: the Hydrographical Office, the Royal Navy and the charting of the Baltic Sea, 1795-1815

n 1795, the Hydrographical Office was created to collate nautical charts for the use of the Royal Navy. One of its greatest challenges was to provide reliable charts for fleets sent to the Baltic Sea. The geography of this region was largely unknown to British admirals and policy-makers alike, provoking both operational and strategic issues for the naval administration. Faced with economic threats to its sources of shipbuilding resources during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, the Royal Navy was ordered into the Baltic on three occasions. On each occasion its operational viability was determined by the degree to which it could navigate the waters of the Baltic safely. This article traces the success with which Britain was able to come to terms with an environment of which it was ignorant in 1795. In the years immediately after 1795, charts of the Baltic were inaccurate and unreliable. However, repeated incursions into the Baltic during the following 20 years provided an opportunity to gather hydrographical information. British understanding of the Baltic Sea improved dramatically, opening the region to the potency of British naval power. The advancement of maritime knowledge required seamanship and navigational skill in the Baltic, but also an effective administration in London to collect information and retain it for future needs. This article therefore outlines a broad understanding of ‘sea power’ based not just on physical might, leadership and tactics, but on administration and the retention and dissemination of knowledge. This is understood in a context of increasing state engagement with British geography as a strategic tool, as witnessed also by the Ordnance Survey. The development of surveying in this period also tells us much about the ‘quantifying spirit’ of the late eighteenth century, and how such impulses were writ large on the political and strategic world.

 

Keeping Traditional Seamanship Alive

slide show

(Image from the Excelsior Trust website)

John Wylson of the Excelsior Trust will be presenting the third GMI Research Seminar of the 2011/12 academic year on Wednesday 30th November 2011 at 6pm. His paper is ‘Trying to Keep Traditional Seamanship Alive at Lowestoft : EXCELSIOR since 1989’. This particular seminar is being hosted in collaboration with the Institute of Seamanship.

EXCELSIOR is an authentically rebuilt Lowestoft smack.  She exists not only to provide an example of the type, but to maintain the knowledge of how to sail and how to look after such vessels.  In so doing, the skills of local seamen and shipwrights of three generations ago are being kept alive.   These crafts were constructed, fished and propelled sustainably and her continued existence is an important reminder of a very different age.

The seminar will take place in room 075, Queen Anne Court, Univeristy of Greenwich, SE10 9LS at 6pm. Tea & Coffee will be available from 5.30pm and a glass of wine afterwards. The seminar is free and there is no need to book, everyone is welcome.