Dr Cathryn Pearce
BA (University of Alaska Fairbanks) MA (University of Victoria) PhD (Greenwich)
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Honorary Research Associate |
Growing up on the Alaskan coast has given me an appreciation for the sea that led to my specialisation in maritime history, and ultimately to Greenwich. I came to the GMI as a doctoral student for my sabbatical year from the University of Alaska Anchorage-Kenai Peninsula College (UAA-KPC), where I taught history in a non-research position for fourteen years, including two years as Chair of the Department of Social Sciences. I completed my Ph.D. in 2007 with my thesis on Cornish wrecking, in which I investigated the actual practices of wrecking, as opposed to the folkoric narratives. My previous history qualifications include a BA in History from the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, and an MA in British and Maritime History from the University of Victoria in Canada. My MA thesis is on the Hudson’s Bay Company Marine Department on the Northwest Coast, where I investigated the establishment of the HBC in the nineteenth century maritime fur trade, and the obstacles they faced. I was appointed Honorary Research Associate at the GMI in Autumn 2008 upon my permanent return to England.
My research interests include
· Local and Regional Maritime History, centering on
o A continuation of my doctoral research on wrecking, with focus on the development and use of wrecking narratives, and an extension of my geographical focus beyond Cornwall so I may further develop my studies from a comparative perspective.
o The role of shipwrecks in coastal communities, including legitimate salvage activities, lifesaving, and the treatment of shipwreck survivors.
· Exploration of the Northwest Coast of North America, particularly in Alaska waters. I am working on an article in collaboration with Dr. Alan Boraas, Professor of Anthropology at UAA-KPC on Peter Puget, R.N. and his reconnaissance of Cook Inlet, Alaska, including his contact with the Russian promyshlenniki and the local native group, the Dena’ina.
Select Publications and Professional Activities:
Cornish Wrecking, 1700-1860: Reality and Popular Myth, Boydell and Brewer, forthcoming 2010.
‘“Neglectful or Worse:’” A Lurid Tale of a Lighthouse Keeper and Wrecking,’ Troze, online peer-reviewed journal of the National Maritime Museum Cornwall, Sept 2008.
“Mentoring Undergraduate Research Students in History,” in Kenrick Mock and Eric S. Murphy, eds. Mentoring Undergraduates in Research and Scholarship. Anchorage: University of Alaska Anchorage, 2008.
Historical Consultant and Interview for BBC Radio 4’s “Making History” programme, September 2008. To be aired December 2008.
Historical Consultant and Interview by BBC’s flagship documentary “Timewatch” series for episode “In Search of the Wreckers.” Aired January 2008.
‘The Cornish Arundells and their Right of Wreck’ chapter for the New Maritime History of Cornwall, edited by Philip Payton, Director of the Institute of Cornish Studies, University of Exeter, and Helen Doe, Centre for Maritime Historical Studies, University of Exeter. Forthcoming 2009.
Book review, The Wreckers: A Story of Killing Seas and Plundered Shipwrecks, from the 18th century to the Present Day, by Bella Bathurst, for International Journal of Maritime History, Vol. XVII, No. 2 (December 2005), pp. 411-412.
Book review, Encounters with a Distant Land: Exploration and the Great Northwest, ed. by Carlos Schwantes, for Alaska History: the Journal of the Alaska Historical Society, Vol. 12, No. 1 (Spring 1997), pp. 51-52.
Select Conference Papers and Public Presentations
“Lured by False Lights: Cornish Wrecking and Victorian Myth,” International Congress of Maritime History, University of Greenwich, June 2008.
‘“...the grim hell-hounds prowling round the shore... :” Cornwall and the communal practice of wrecking in the long eighteenth century’. Shipwreck in the Long Eighteenth-Century Conference, University of Nottingham-Trent and the National Maritime Museum, London, England, May 2006.
“‘...Greedy Cormorants waiting for their prey:” Cornish Wreckers and Wrecking, ca. 1700-1860’. (revised). University of Greenwich History Seminar Series, November 2004.
“‘...to prevent the cargo becoming prey to the populace:’ Reaction of the Governing Authorities to Wrecking in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries’. Crossmead International Conference, University of Exeter, UK, October 2004.
“‘Neglectful or Worse:’ A Lurid Tale of a Lighthouse Keeper and Wrecking’. First Cornwall Maritime History Conference, National Maritime Museum, Falmouth, Cornwall, September 2004.
“‘...Greedy Cormorants waiting for their prey:’ Cornish Wreckers and Wrecking, ca. 1700-1860’. International Commission of Maritime History, British Division, King’s College, University of London, May 2004.
“‘So Barbarous a practice:’ Cornish Wrecking, ca. 1700-1860, and Its Survival as Popular Myth: The Clarification of a Conceptual Problem’. National Maritime Museum Staff Research Seminars, National Maritime Museum, London, June 2003.
“So Did They Really Do It? An Examination of the Cornish Reputation for Wrecking’. New Researchers in Maritime History Conference, National Maritime Museum, London, March 2003.
“Willing and Unwilling: Women Travellers on the Pacific Northwest Coast, 1787-1870.’ Society for the History of Discoveries/Hakluyt Society Annual Meeting and Conference, St. John’s Newfoundland, August 1997.