A YOUNG man who has always lived close enough to Durban’s port to hear ship’s horns as they come into the harbour, has turned his curiosity of the large vessels into his first book, Waves of Change.
A researcher at UKZN, Shaun Ruggunan’s book looks into how globalisation has impacted seafaring and the shipping industry’s labour markets over the years. He said the book was a culmination of a three-year journey of discovery. “What really shocked me was how we live in Durban but don’t know much about this very important industry. The role of the ocean and ships in our daily lives is so important, yet we don’t have a clue about how it works. Everything we use in our daily lives whether it is a vehicle, food, oil, the pen you write with, cellphone you’re holding and basically 90 per cent of all goods are brought into the country on ships sailing on the sea!”
Ruggunan said researching off and on over the years has really been “an eye opener”. “As an academic you want to write a book more than just for academia but for the people to read, and I think this is an important book for Durbanites to read because it looks at people who worked in the industry. I discovered fascinating stories of people and sailors who worked on our ships,” he said.
According to Ruggunan, one of the shocking facts he discovered was how racially divided the labour markets were before 1994. “Non whites pre-1994 could work on ships but not as an officer and sailors of colour could not even enter the officers quarters. Today it has changed a lot and there are diverse crews, with a lot of emphasis on training people of colour, especially women, and is a viable career. What was also interesting is the notion that sailors reputation of having much leisure time at various ports , also the drunken sailor and promiscuous sailor labels, have really changed, mainly because of technology that has streamlined the processes. A ship doesn’t need to dock for a week any longer,” he explained.
“My aim of writing the book was to brand Durban as a maritime city with a rich maritime history. The waves in my title refer to three waves in the industry- Employment, where mainly European sailors occupied positions as sailors pre-1970, Technology, and how it changed the industry and, Globalisation and how the concept has made the world smaller, easier to work in. Also airplaneswith their pilots are always seen as the cooler form of transportation, I was also a little boy who wanted to be a pilot but now want people to see the importance of seafarers and that it is a good career path because South Africa only has about 350 seafarers and are looking to grow,” he added.
During his three years researching the book, Ruggunan spent more than six months researching and speaking to seafarers, crewing agencies, shipping companies in Manila, Philippines, which has the most seafarers in the world (one of four seafarers are Filipino) and the UK and closer to home, Richards Bay, Cape Town and, of course, Durban.
Waves of Change is available at Adams bookstores and www.loot.o.za. For more information or get a copy of the book email ruggunans@gmail.com
