I loved\u00a0Acheson’s description of lobstermen as “rugged individualists…willing to defend his independence with violence if necessary” (2). \u00a0This seemed to set lobstermen apart from other fishermen, making it understandable that their”clusters” are commonly referred to as “gangs.” \u00a0However, Acheson cites the distinctive feature of lobster gangs as their territorality–claiming and defending fishing areas along the Maine coast. \u00a0This reminded me of our conversations about the\u00a0social constructivism of place. \u00a0Lobstermen are essentially redifining place by staking claim to different areas of the sea. \u00a0Over generations, lobster families have continued to lobster in the same areas of the harbor while defending their territory from new lobstermen or others attempts to expands. \u00a0What truly amazed me about this is the fact that to most people (main-landers) the harbor just looks like a chaotic free for all of fishing mayhem where anything goes, while\u00a0the lobstermen see a completely different place. \u00a0Lobstermen must see the different lobster pots as property lines between them and their neighbors the same way a\u00a0fence defines the line between\u00a0two farmers. \u00a0The difference between these examples is\u00a0that a common person could probably tell you where one farmer’s crop starts and another ends, but at the same time would struggle to draw property lines along the Maine coast simply based on the lobster pots. \u00a0Demonstrating that not only is the territorality of lobstermen a social construct of place, but one that only the people familiar with the sea and in the lobstering community can understand. \u00a0In a way this makes the territories only a space to main-landers who don’t understand the nuances of the lobstering communities, and maybe even just a landscape to some whose understanding of the sea is limited to the visualization of ocean on the horizon. \u00a0While to the lobstermen who wake up early\u00a0and\u00a0head out to sea to make their rounds just as their family has been doing for generations, the harbor is a place of work, history, and family.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I loved\u00a0Acheson’s description of lobstermen as “rugged individualists…willing to defend his independence with violence if necessary” (2). \u00a0This seemed to set lobstermen apart from other fishermen, making it understandable that their”clusters” are commonly referred to as “gangs.” \u00a0However, Acheson cites the distinctive feature of lobster gangs as their territorality–claiming and defending fishing areas along the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6517,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[329829],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/allen-island\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/allen-island\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/allen-island\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/allen-island\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6517"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/allen-island\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/allen-island\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":136,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/allen-island\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129\/revisions\/136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/allen-island\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/allen-island\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/allen-island\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}