Henry Trotter's Curriculum Vitae
Education
- Yale University
- Ph.D. History : 2009 (expected)
Dissertation: "Port Culture: A Modern History of South African Sailors, Stevedores & Sugar Girls"
Advisors: Robert Harms, Michael R. Mahoney & James C. Scott
- Yale University
- M.Phil. History (May 2005)
Examination fields:- Modern African History - Robert Harms
- South African History - Michael R. Mahoney
- Modern South-East Asian History - Ben Kiernan
- Global Maritime History - Gaddis Smith
- Yale University
- M.A. African Studies (May 2002)
Thesis: "Removals and Remembrance: Commemorating Community in Coloured Cape Town"
Advisors: Eric Worby & Michael R. Mahoney
- California State Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo
- B.A. English (June 1999) : Magna Cum Laude
Senior Essay: "The Strategic Symbol of District Six: Protest and Community in Coloured South African Literature"
Advisor: Debora Schwartz
- University of Zimbabwe
- Exchange student (March-December 1994)
Publications
- Sugar Girls & Seamen: A Journey into the World of Dockside Prostitution in South Africa
- (Johannesburg: Jacana, 2008).
- Sailing Beyond Apartheid: The Impact of Seafaring on Coloured South African Seamen
- in Carina Ray & Jeremy Rich (Eds.), Navigating African Maritime History, Research in Maritime History (St John's, Newfoundland: International Maritime Economic History Association, forthcoming)
- Soliciting Sailors: The Temporal Dynamics of Dockside Prostitution in South Africa
- Journal of Southern African Studies (forthcoming).
- Trauma and Memory: The Impact of Apartheid-Era Forced Removals on Coloured Identity in Cape Town
- in Mohamed Adhikari (Ed.), The Predicament of Marginality: Coloured Identity in Southern Africa (Cape Town: University of Cape Town Press, forthcoming).
- Dockside Prostitution in South African Ports
- History Compass Vol.6, No.3 (2008): 673-690.
- Navigating Risk: Lessons From the Dockside Sex Trade for Reducing Violence in South Africa's Prostitution Industry
- Sexuality Research & Social Policy: Journal of NSRC Vol. 4, No. 4 (Dec 2007): 106-119.
- The Women of Durban's Dockside Sex Industry
- in Rob Pattman & Sultan Khan (Eds.), Undressing Durban (Durban: Madiba Press, 2007), pp. 441-452.
- Sailors as Scribes: Travel Discourse and the (Con)textualization of the Khoikhoi at the Cape of Good Hope, 1649-1690
- Journal of African Travel-Writing Vols. 8 & 9 (2001), pp. 30-44.
- Compensation for a Native Mineworker
- Ufahamu Vol. 26, Nos. 2 & 3 (1998), pp. 105-109.
Scholarships & Awards
Doctoral Program (Ph.D.) |
|
| Yale University Dissertation Fellowship |
2008-9 |
| Fox International Fellowship |
2007-8 |
| Fulbright-Hays Dissertation Research Grant |
2005-6 |
| SSRC International Dissertation Field Research Fellowship |
2005-6 |
| J. William Fulbright Scholarship (IIE) |
2005-6 |
| Yale Center for International & Area Studies Pre-Dissertation Grant |
2005 |
| Agrarian Studies Summer Fellowship |
2005 |
| Yale Center for International & Area Studies Pre-Dissertation Grant |
2003 |
| Agrarian Studies Summer Fellowship |
2003 |
Master's Program (M.A.) |
|
| African Studies Award for Academic Excellence |
2002 |
| Foreign Language & Area Studies (FLAS) Scholarship |
2001-2 |
| Fulbright-Hays Grant (Summer) |
2001 |
| Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship |
2000-1 |
| Foreign Language & Area Studies (FLAS) Scholarship |
1999- 2000 |
| Yale Tuition Fellowship |
1999 |
| FLAS Scholarship (Summer) |
1999 |
Bachelor's Program (B.A.) |
|
| Senior Recognition Award
|
1999 |
Conference & Seminar Papers
- Cunning Linguists: Dockside Prostitutes and their Mastery of Foreign Tongues
- presented at the Story of the Voyage Colloquium, hosted by the University of Witwatersrand Institute for Social and Economic Research (WISER) and the Wits Centre for Indian Studies in Africa, 3 October 2008
- Sugar Girls & Seamen
- presented at the School of Sociology & Social Studies Seminar Series at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 18 September 2008
- Soliciting Sailors: The Temporal Dynamics of Dockside Prostitution in South Africa
- presented at the University of Cape Town African & Comparative History Seminar Series, 9 April 2008
- Port Culture: A Modern History of South African Sailors, Stevedores & Sugar Girls—A Dissertation Blueprint
- presented at the University of KwaZulu-Natal History and African Studies Seminar Series, Durban, 23 August 2006
- Trauma and Memory: The Impact of Apartheid-Era Forced Removals on Coloured Identity in Cape Town
- presented at the University of the Western Cape History Department Seminar Series, August 8, 2006; also at the University of Cape Town African & Comparative History Seminar Series, 29 September 2006
- Advanced African Language Training: "Backdoor" Languages & Comparative Techniques
- presented at the Paths to Advanced Proficiency in the Less Commonly Taught Languages Conference, Yale University, 23 March 2003
- Commemorating Community in Coloured Cape Town
- presented at African Studies Association Annual Conference, Washington DC, 7 December 2002
- Public Health / Private Death: Cape Malay Resistance to Municipal Disease Control in Nineteenth Century Cape Town
- presented at the Africa: Past, Present, and Future Interdisciplinary Graduate Conference on Africa, UCLA, 15 April 2000
Invited Talks
- Cape Town's Dockside Culture
- presented to students of the University of Virginia's Semester at Sea program, Cape Town, 26 September 2008
- Sugar Girls & Seamen: Dockside Prostitution in South Africa
- presented at the University of the Third Age (U3A), Cape Town, 26 August 2008
Field Research
- Dissertation Research 2005-2008
- Cape Town, Durban & Port Elizabeth : South Africa.
Conducted research on contemporary South African port culture, including archival work, secondary literature examination, personal and group interviews, and participant-observation at the docks (with stevedores and port officials), at sea (with tugboat crews and sailors/passengers on the luxury cruise vessel MSC Melody, which I sailed on for 5 days from Durban to Mozambique and back), and in dockside nightclubs (where "sugar girls" solicit sailors).
- Preliminary Dissertation Research 2003-2004
- Pacific, Indian & Atlantic Oceans.
Sailed for two months on two cargo ships from Los Angeles to Cape Town (via east Asia, the Indian Ocean, Suez Canal, Mediterranean, Northern Europe, and the west coast of Africa). Using participant-observation techniques, I explored contemporary shipboard culture and surveyed the dockside scene at 14 ports. Utilized participant-observation techniques and conducted interviews with the German, Tuvaluan, Russian, British, Filipino, and South African sailors that were on the ships.
- Cape Town : South Africa
- Conducted interviews with dockworkers, prostitutes, tugboat crews, shipping administrators, and dockside cab drivers to assess the feasibility of writing a dissertation on contemporary South African port culture.
- Language Training 2001
- KwaZulu-Natal : South Africa
Received intensive Advanced Zulu language training for 10 weeks through the Fulbright-Hays Summer Group Projects Abroad Program lead by Yale's Zulu Instructor Sandra Sanneh.
- Master's Thesis Research 2000-2001
- Cape Town : South Africa
Conducted research on the impact of apartheid-era forced removals on the memory and narrative production of black communities in the Cape peninsula. Tape-recorded over 100 life history interviews with victims of racial evictions for my 334-page MA thesis, titled "Removals and Remembrance: Commemorating Community in Coloured Cape Town."
Work & Research Experience
- Teaching Fellow
- Modern African History: Africa Since 1880, Professor Michael R. Mahoney
Spring 2005
- Teaching Fellow
- Southern African History, Professor Michael R. Mahoney
Fall 2004
- Website Designer
- Yale University: I have designed and maintained a number of websites for various Yale departments and programs. Sites include: IsiZulu Sanamuhla, online Zulu language instruction (2002); Yale Guide to African Languages and Literatures (2002); African Studies Program (2002); Africana Librarians' Conference (2003); Yale Library's Africana Collection (2004); Yale History department (2004); and the African Language Teacher's Association Conference (2005).
June 2002 - August 2007
- Research Assistant
- Africa and the West: A Documentary History from the Slave Trade to Independence (Oryx Press, 2001)
For Professors William Worger (UCLA) & Nancy Clark (Cal Poly).
January 1998 - June 1999
- High School English Teacher
- St. George's College, Harare, Zimbabwe: taught literature at prominent boys'
high school
January - May 1995
Other Distinguished Experiences
- African Travels : 1994-1997
- For four years , I studied, traveled, and worked in Africa, visiting 17 countries. After a year as an exchange student at the University of Zimbabwe, I taught for five months at a private boys' high school in Harare, Zimbabwe, thereafter backpacking for two-and-a-half years country to country in eastern & southern Africa and the Indian Ocean islands. In each country, I traveled extensively, pursuing a personal intellectual project: to read as widely and deeply of each nation's literature. Over the course of four years, I read over 300 works of African literature and another 100 books on African history, economics, politics, and culture. This experience laid the foundation for my current endeavors as a scholar of Africa.
