November 9, 2024 • 22 mins
New Bedford's fishing industry has been a cornerstone of the South Coast economy for centuries. It's also led the city to become a melting pot of traditions and culture, as people from all over the world come to the city to find their way into the industry. This month, the New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center is opening a new exhibit to focus on those workers' stories called "Casting a Wider Net". NBFHC Director Laura Orleans and Project Manager Emma York join the show this week to share the details of this comprehensive exhibit.
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
From WBZ News Radio in Boston. This is New England Weekend.
Each and every week right here, we come together and
talk about all the topics important to you and the
place where you live. As always, it's so good to
be back with you this week. I'm Nicole Davis. Through
centuries of hard work, both out at sea and back
here on shore, the men and women who make up
New Bedford's fishing industry have helped to build it into
(00:29):
a cornerstone of the Bay State economy and become America's
most valuable fishing port. The city has become a melting
pot of traditions because of that. As people from all
over the world have made their way to New Bedford
to get on a boat, the city and its people
have evolved as well as the industry. And this month,
the New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center is opening up a
new exhibit focusing on the stories of the people who
(00:52):
made it happen. It's called casting a Wider Net. So
let's learn more about it right now. Laura Orleans is here.
She is the director of this center, and Emma York
is here as well. She's the project manager for this exhibit. Ladies,
it is so good to have you both, And for Laura,
people might not know exactly what happens at the center,
what your mission is, what you focus on. Let's start
(01:13):
off with learning a bit more about that.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Absolutely, so they say, or some say, that commercial fishing
is actually the nation's oldest industry. Sometimes we joke and
say prostitution might fly for that title. But but commercial
fishing has been going on basically since the beginning of
time in some senses. So indigenous people certainly fished more
(01:35):
in a subsistence manner, but commercial fishing was going on
on the South Coast long before whaling, for example. It
has continued, you know, beyond whaling. And one of the
things that the story that we tell really here in
New Bedford is an analog, I guess, to the story
of whaling. So a lot of people when they think
(01:56):
about the city of New Bedford, they think about Moby Dick,
and they think about that rich history of whaling, but
they don't understand that today we are at the nation's
number one fishing port in terms of the value of
the catch. There are about seven thousand people employed in
our commercial fishing industry today, in a combination of at
sea and on shore jobs. So it's something that spans
(02:18):
time and it is something that has brought many people
to this area looking for work. So that's part of
what this project is looking at as well, is where
people come from, what are the skills and traditions and
knowledge basis that they bring, and who are they because
a lot of these folks in this project are not
people whose stories have been told particularly well at all.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
No, it's true. And the beautiful thing about the South Coast,
along with you know, the beautiful beaches and the great food,
you drive by New Bedford on the highway and you
see fishing boats everywhere. The beautiful thing about New Bedford
is that it is synonymous with that culture. And you
bring up a really good point that you need people
to run the fishing boats, and it's become a very
diverse industry. So how do we get there?
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Yeah, So what I would say is it's always been diverse,
so commercial and I'm speaking specifically about commercial fishing, but
many people know the Portuguese community largely from the mainland
of Portugal and from the Azores, and a lot of
Azorian people did actually come on whaling ships or were
involved in the whaling industry. And then transferred skills as
(03:28):
commercial fishing became more of an economic engine. So I
will say that, you know, we were known as the
whaling capital of the world up until the end of
whaling nineteen twenty four. Commercial fishing, like I said, has
existed alongside that and for a long time, but as
an economic sort of significant economic engine in the region.
(03:49):
That really began around nineteen nine, nineteen oh nine, so
little more than one hundred years here in terms of
its economic significance anyway, So we have the Portuguese community.
We all also have a significant Norwegian community. They came
more in the twenties. They started in Brooklyn, New York
and made their way up to New Bedford. They dominated
(04:10):
and continued to dominate the scallop industry. And then there
are people from the Canadian Maritimes also significantly involved, so
from Newfoundland and Nova Scotia. So those that kind of triumvirate,
not to mention people from Ireland in Scotland and Poland
and Latvia and so on and so forth. People that
are the subject of this exhibit are people from the
(04:32):
Cape Verde Islands, people from Vietnam, people from Guatemala, El Salvador,
and people from Puerto Rico and Cuba, and so these
are lesser known communities within the sphere of commercial fishing.
And I would say too that we're looking not only
at people who actually go out on the boats, but
also the whole shore side infrastructure. So people who are
(04:55):
involved in offloading the fish, people are involved in cutting
the fish and trucking it, people who are involved in
the maintaining of boats and the engines, and the building
of the gear, the nets and so on. So there's
just a whole huge group of people involved in all
those aspects. And many of the people in this project
either themselves were involved or in some cases they're talking
(05:17):
about family members from a previous generation.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
Yeah, let's talk about how this idea of this project
to highlight these incredible people, because I could never do
what they do. Let's just be really straight up about this.
I could never do what fisher men and women do
because there are plenty of women who work in the
industry as well. And Emma will get to you for
a little bit more of the detail here in a second.
But you know, Laura, tell me about why the museum
(05:41):
wanted to make this happen.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Sure, so our mission is literally telling the story of
New Bedford's fishing industry to the world. So this idea
of making a local story and making it relevant to
the world. And because port cities everywhere, waterfronts everywhere are
kind of the nexus or whatever or for people to come.
I mean, it's a port, it's a place where commerce happens,
(06:06):
it's a place where immigration happens. So that's just a
part of the story. But the fishing Heritagetender has always
been very dedicated to the idea of an inclusive storytelling model,
and we are not actually telling the story. It's kind
of a funny quirk. We're creating a venue for that
story to be told by the people who live it
every day. That's the way I like to think about it.
(06:27):
And so this project follows on other projects that we've
done looking at gender. You know, you mentioned women in
the fishing industry. We did a whole deep dive into that.
Several years ago. We did an immigration exhibit that looked
at six individuals from new and old immigrant communities. But
in this particular case, we really wanted to look at
communities whose stories hadn't been told in a deep and
(06:51):
rich way, and I think what Emma will talk about
is the nature of how we did this project was
really to have not only people telling their own stories,
but people collecting those stories who mirror the cultures that
are being explored.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
One reason that the Center wanted to do the Casting
a Wider Net project, in my understanding, is to build
local capacity for people to be able to tell their
own stories, particularly thinking about positionality. So the type of
interview that's going to happen if it's an English speaker
speaking with someone whose first language is not English, is
going to be very different than an interview that was
(07:27):
conducted in their home language and the language that they
felt most comfortable with. And likewise, the types of conversations
and the types of trust building that happen when you
know the person sitting in front of you asking the
questions has some visceral understanding of who you are, what
your experiences have been, whether it's because they share an
ethnic background, or a work background or a gender background,
(07:51):
is really important. And so I think you'll see in
the Casting Wider Net exhibit that some of the stories
that were able to be unearthed were stories that the
Center never would have been able to capture had we
not built in training for nine community ethnographers from these
communities to do the work themselves.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
So, yeah, talk to me about the process then of
pulling all these stories together, because obviously you had to
go find the people to tell the stories. What was
that like when you were literally casting the wide net
asking for these stories.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
So we began by actually building our cohort of nine
community ethnographers. We felt it was really important to pay
the community ethnographers a stipend despite the fact that they
were getting training, because it's really hard work to learn
how to interview and to transcribe interviews. So it began
with sort of putting a call out to the community.
(08:41):
And both Laura and I are deeply rooted in this community.
I've lived here my entire life, so in certain ways
we were able to draw upon our connection to this
place and personal networks. But put a call out asking
people who would be interested in being paid to learn
oral history techniques and interview people from the Cape Verdian, Vietnamese,
(09:02):
Central American, Puerto Rican, and Cuban communities with ties to
the commercial fishing industry, and the response was really wonderful.
We actually had to turn folks away. We didn't have
enough grant money to fund more than nine community ethnographer positions,
and so it was a shot in the dark in
some ways. We weren't sure what the response would be.
And I think that people are craving these types of stories.
(09:26):
They're craving the ability to build their capacity to help
tell those stories. And so our hope is that this
is just a pilot of a program that is replicable
and can be continued. Lots of people when we reached out,
said what about telling the story of Wampanog peoples? What
about telling the story of West Indian people? There are
(09:47):
so many different cultures and ethnic communities in the commercial
fishing industry, and I see this exhibit as just the beginning.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
In this era full of rhetoric about immigration and a
lot of people talking about the concept of immigration and
where we move forward as a country with immigration. So
many people come to this country to do these jobs,
these hard jobs like working in the fishing industry. Through
these stories, what have you learned? What have people been
telling you about their stories.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
One of the things that was not surprising, but it
was gratifying was something that Emma said before, which is
that people were more open I think in these situations
than they would have been had the interview or not
been from their culture. And people talked about a lot
of pretty touchy subjects and hardship to some extent. I mean,
there's a story of resilience that we like to point to,
(10:37):
but there's also a lot of people slogged through to
get here in the first place, to learn their job,
to get good at their job. Sometimes the job was
a stepping stone to get elsewhere. There's a lot of
pride I think among people for all that they've accomplished
in the fishing industry and just in the United States.
(11:01):
And we're also looking at you know, somebody from Puerto
Rico is a very different story than somebody from Vietnam
or somebody from Central America. Right, so the circumstances like
Vietnamese were refugees after the war, Puerto Ricans are citizens.
Central American people are often coming here in desperation without
you know, the different immigration status, and so that also
(11:23):
was when people see this. It's a very visual exhibit.
We worked with a local capabridy and photographer, but two
of the people don't have photographs, and Emma can maybe
articulate why that is.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
Yeah, I'd love to hear about that. Why is that?
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Yeah? So we had to think a lot about how
to one present oral history in an exhibit format, but
too how to present the stories of people who were
not comfortable being photographed due to citizenship citizenship status, and
we have landed on the idea that we really want
to draw attention to the absence of those photos in
(11:58):
a couple of the exhibit pannels, because undocumented workers are
a huge part of how the commercial fishing industry and
many of the industries that feed our country work, and
so we wanted to kind of put viewers in the
shoes of those folks and have them have an opportunity
to hear directly from people about why it is they came.
(12:22):
And hopefully this exhibit will help bridge some divides and
gaps and understanding between older, more established immigrant groups that
tend to dominate the commercial fishing industry and some of
the newer communities, specifically the Central American community, who have
become a large part of fish processing. And I think
(12:44):
there will be some interesting stories to think about. We
had some older Cape Verdian women who spoke about either
their own work in fish processing or their parents work
as first generation immigrants from the Cape Ford Islands. And
we also had people who are currently work or have
worked in seafood processing from the Central American community. And
(13:05):
so it's really interesting to see those similarities, and I'm
excited to see our community athnographers and our narrators start
to make some of those connections.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
So many hands touch the fish and then all the
stories that go along with those people who all have
a part in putting together our lunch or our dinner,
our lobster role when we're on vacation. And I really
appreciate the fact that you're kind of breaking this down
to show people the human side of an industry that
really I think, you know, you've got your TV shows,
your Deadliest Catch and stuff like that, but you don't
(13:36):
really hear a lot of talk about the fishing industry
unless it's like hollywoodized.
Speaker 3 (13:40):
Yeah, and you'll see there's a variety of shore side
businesses and jobs that are featured in the exhibit. So
we have a Cuban netmaker who works at Radars trial
and manufacturing. We have somebody who drove trucks. So the
people who transport your seafood from the boat to the
restaurant or to the auction, and we have people who
(14:01):
work as longshoremen, and people who talked about the previous
generation who worked as stevedores unloading offloading boats and now
offloading wind turbines as New Bedford's offshore wind industry takes hold.
Speaker 1 (14:16):
What so far has been the reaction from the museum
doing this in the first place? What are you hearing
about this so far?
Speaker 3 (14:22):
We gathered with our cohort of community ethnographers for three
trainings leading up to their interviews, and each training we
had food that was reflective of the cultures we were interviewing,
and it became a really communal atmosphere. And the first
time we met, I asked everybody how many of you
have been to the New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center before,
and almost no hands raised. So almost all of our
(14:45):
community ethnographers were interacting with the center for the very
first time through this project, and I recall Paula, one
of our community ethnographers, saying, Wow, this little center is
doing so much and it's so interesting to that you're
telling the story of working people. I don't see working
people on the walls of museums in this city. Or
(15:08):
frankly in the country. And so I think that was
a huge takeaway in a working class city like New Bedford,
to see that working people and their stories are valued
was definitely a take away.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Yeah. Sure, And what about you, Laura.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
So I would say the same. I mean, I think
that people who've been been here before and have been
following us. We've only been open eight years, so we're
you know, we're small, and we're new fish. But I
would say that people are starting to, I don't know,
to understand the breadth of the kinds of stories we tell.
I don't think that from the outside, if you hear
(15:47):
the word Fishing Heritage Center, your first thought is probably
not this exhibit or this kind of content.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
Probably right.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
And in fact, a lot of people who sort of
stumble in, you know, they've been to the National Park
or the Whaling Museum, some of the more dominant cultural attractions,
and they're on their way back to the parking garage
and they happen to see our sign and they come
in are usually really surprised to find out that there's
a way to learn about the contemporary fishing industry. You know,
they are sort of like, oh, I thought it was
(16:14):
all about history because it says heritage.
Speaker 1 (16:16):
Yeah, it's not all like spearing whales.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
I mean, there's a lot right going on so right exactly,
And for me, the word heritage really is a past
present future idea to continuum. I mean, are these are
people making history today? I guess this is one way
you could say it. But I think that people are
becoming more you know, sort of. It's not just a
room full of boat models. It really is stories about people.
(16:40):
It really is stories about people in your neighborhood, you know,
so it's very local. On the other hand, these are issues,
as you were kind of pointing to, that are national
and global. These are issues about migration and immigration. These
are issues about unions and labor. These are issues about
gender roles, these are issues about addiction in some cases
(17:01):
came up. So you know, these are many different issues
that the their stories about family, their story. In fact,
we have five themes that kind of run throughout the
exhibit that we kind of you know, pulled out of
sort of hearing common things over and over again from
different people. And in general, what I would say is,
when thinking about what I hope happens here, it's kind
(17:24):
of what Emma said, I really hope that people take
the time because it is you know, you need to
take the time to put in the little earphones and
listen deeply, and you know, I think what will happen
is you may sort of think I have nothing in
common with this person. They are so different from me,
their life is so different. And when you listen, I
(17:46):
hope that you actually realize that you have a lot
more in common than you thought.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
Many of us do. So, Emma, let's talk quickly about
the upcoming exhibit opening. You've got a big event planned
on the fourteenth. Tell us about somebody wants to come,
how they can get tickets, what they'll expect to see
when they get there, so on and so forth.
Speaker 3 (18:05):
So in the spirit of inclusivity, this is not a
ticketed event. It is completely free, open to the public
and anyone can drop in between six pm and eight
pm on Thursday, November fourteenth, which is ahah Night, a
night when downtown New Bedford comes alive with art, history
and architecture programming, all free and open to the public.
If you come on that night, you can expect to
(18:29):
one be able to experience the exhibit in full for
the first time to get to hear some testimonials from
our community ethnographers who conducted all of the interviews for
this project and talk one on one with them, and
three have a taste of some of the cultures that
are represented in the exhibit. So we're going to be
(18:49):
having some light refreshments, all from local restaurants or in
some cases cooked by by the people who are part
of this project who bring some cooking expertise. And then
one of our community ethnographers, Colleen, happens to be a
DJ as well as an interviewer and awesome culture bearer
in our communities, so she has created a playlist of
(19:11):
music drawing from all of the cultures that are represented
in the exhibit. So you can expect some music, some food, community,
and an opportunity to listen to the stories of all
fourteen people who were interviewed as a part of this project.
Check out an awesome introductory video created by our videographer
Lea Onifrey. And then there's an interactive element to the
(19:34):
exhibit as well, so people will have an opportunity to
reflect on how their own personal story connects to some
of the stories that they've heard or connections that they're
noticing between different narrators stories and as Laura was saying,
the interesting thing about the Center and this exhibit is
that it is so community centric and place based, and
so we wanted to play with that a little bit
(19:55):
in our exhibit and our exhibit opening. So there will
be a guestbook, and if people are particularly moved by
a story or resonate with or connect to someone's story,
they can actually write them a letter and that can
be sent to the person.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
So there is a little bit.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
Of interaction and back and forth, and there'll be a
little scrapbook of photos so that everyone can check out
the photos that were taken as part of this project
or collected because we have some archival photos from I
don't know how far back, but at least seventy years.
Speaker 1 (20:26):
That's incredible. Okay, there was a lot going on that
one night, but it's going to be worth it. And
I think it's important to note too, Laura, where is
the center, how do we get there all the basic
stuff and where can people find out more about this event?
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Sure? So, physically we are located at thirty eight Bethel
Street in downtown New Bedford. We're half a block from
the Whaling Museum and about half a block from the
one of the city garages on Elm Street. You can
find out more on our website, which is Fishing Heritage
Center dot org. We have a calendar of events and
links to more information about this particular project. I will
(21:04):
also say this is a kickoff event, right so November fourteenth,
this is the first day that the exhibit will be
open to the public. The exhibit will remain on display
here through the end of May, at which point the
plan is to travel at least components of it to
different community sites. So that's going to be exciting. And
then in the meantime, we're excited about ways to work
(21:26):
with local schools or any schools actually that might want
to engage with this, so schools, but also we will
have a lot of public programming, so films and cooking classes,
so potentially you can learn how to make some Vietnamese seafoods,
some capbirdie and seafood okay, And then you know other
kinds of programming like talks and tours and so on.
(21:47):
So we're very excited about the many different ways that
we can kind of dive deeper with the exhibit as
a Springboard for.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
Sure, and then of course on social media. I'm sure
you're going to be talking about this your website. That's
where people should go to keep in touch with all
the different elements I guess that are coming up in
the next few months.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (22:04):
Yeah, And all of the interviews will also be accessible
in the Center's archives, but also on Noah's archives.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Oh okay, yeah.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
So they'll be accessible there and you can check out
photos and the full transcript of each interview.
Speaker 1 (22:19):
Emma and Laura, thank you for your time on the
show and best of luck with the exhibit. Please have
a safe and healthy and happy weekend. Join me again
next week for another edition of the show. I'm Nicole
Davis from WBZ News Radio on iHeartRadio.
From WBZ News Radio in Boston. This is New England Weekend.
Each and every week right here, we come together and
talk about all the topics important to you and the
place where you live. As always, it's so good to
be back with you this week. I'm Nicole Davis. Through
centuries of hard work, both out at sea and back
here on shore, the men and women who make up
New Bedford's fishing industry have helped to build it into
(00:29):
a cornerstone of the Bay State economy and become America's
most valuable fishing port. The city has become a melting
pot of traditions because of that. As people from all
over the world have made their way to New Bedford
to get on a boat, the city and its people
have evolved as well as the industry. And this month,
the New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center is opening up a
new exhibit focusing on the stories of the people who
(00:52):
made it happen. It's called casting a Wider Net. So
let's learn more about it right now. Laura Orleans is here.
She is the director of this center, and Emma York
is here as well. She's the project manager for this exhibit. Ladies,
it is so good to have you both, And for Laura,
people might not know exactly what happens at the center,
what your mission is, what you focus on. Let's start
(01:13):
off with learning a bit more about that.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Absolutely, so they say, or some say, that commercial fishing
is actually the nation's oldest industry. Sometimes we joke and
say prostitution might fly for that title. But but commercial
fishing has been going on basically since the beginning of
time in some senses. So indigenous people certainly fished more
(01:35):
in a subsistence manner, but commercial fishing was going on
on the South Coast long before whaling, for example. It
has continued, you know, beyond whaling. And one of the
things that the story that we tell really here in
New Bedford is an analog, I guess, to the story
of whaling. So a lot of people when they think
(01:56):
about the city of New Bedford, they think about Moby Dick,
and they think about that rich history of whaling, but
they don't understand that today we are at the nation's
number one fishing port in terms of the value of
the catch. There are about seven thousand people employed in
our commercial fishing industry today, in a combination of at
sea and on shore jobs. So it's something that spans
(02:18):
time and it is something that has brought many people
to this area looking for work. So that's part of
what this project is looking at as well, is where
people come from, what are the skills and traditions and
knowledge basis that they bring, and who are they because
a lot of these folks in this project are not
people whose stories have been told particularly well at all.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
No, it's true. And the beautiful thing about the South Coast,
along with you know, the beautiful beaches and the great food,
you drive by New Bedford on the highway and you
see fishing boats everywhere. The beautiful thing about New Bedford
is that it is synonymous with that culture. And you
bring up a really good point that you need people
to run the fishing boats, and it's become a very
diverse industry. So how do we get there?
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Yeah, So what I would say is it's always been diverse,
so commercial and I'm speaking specifically about commercial fishing, but
many people know the Portuguese community largely from the mainland
of Portugal and from the Azores, and a lot of
Azorian people did actually come on whaling ships or were
involved in the whaling industry. And then transferred skills as
(03:28):
commercial fishing became more of an economic engine. So I
will say that, you know, we were known as the
whaling capital of the world up until the end of
whaling nineteen twenty four. Commercial fishing, like I said, has
existed alongside that and for a long time, but as
an economic sort of significant economic engine in the region.
(03:49):
That really began around nineteen nine, nineteen oh nine, so
little more than one hundred years here in terms of
its economic significance anyway, So we have the Portuguese community.
We all also have a significant Norwegian community. They came
more in the twenties. They started in Brooklyn, New York
and made their way up to New Bedford. They dominated
(04:10):
and continued to dominate the scallop industry. And then there
are people from the Canadian Maritimes also significantly involved, so
from Newfoundland and Nova Scotia. So those that kind of triumvirate,
not to mention people from Ireland in Scotland and Poland
and Latvia and so on and so forth. People that
are the subject of this exhibit are people from the
(04:32):
Cape Verde Islands, people from Vietnam, people from Guatemala, El Salvador,
and people from Puerto Rico and Cuba, and so these
are lesser known communities within the sphere of commercial fishing.
And I would say too that we're looking not only
at people who actually go out on the boats, but
also the whole shore side infrastructure. So people who are
(04:55):
involved in offloading the fish, people are involved in cutting
the fish and trucking it, people who are involved in
the maintaining of boats and the engines, and the building
of the gear, the nets and so on. So there's
just a whole huge group of people involved in all
those aspects. And many of the people in this project
either themselves were involved or in some cases they're talking
(05:17):
about family members from a previous generation.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
Yeah, let's talk about how this idea of this project
to highlight these incredible people, because I could never do
what they do. Let's just be really straight up about this.
I could never do what fisher men and women do
because there are plenty of women who work in the
industry as well. And Emma will get to you for
a little bit more of the detail here in a second.
But you know, Laura, tell me about why the museum
(05:41):
wanted to make this happen.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Sure, so our mission is literally telling the story of
New Bedford's fishing industry to the world. So this idea
of making a local story and making it relevant to
the world. And because port cities everywhere, waterfronts everywhere are
kind of the nexus or whatever or for people to come.
I mean, it's a port, it's a place where commerce happens,
(06:06):
it's a place where immigration happens. So that's just a
part of the story. But the fishing Heritagetender has always
been very dedicated to the idea of an inclusive storytelling model,
and we are not actually telling the story. It's kind
of a funny quirk. We're creating a venue for that
story to be told by the people who live it
every day. That's the way I like to think about it.
(06:27):
And so this project follows on other projects that we've
done looking at gender. You know, you mentioned women in
the fishing industry. We did a whole deep dive into that.
Several years ago. We did an immigration exhibit that looked
at six individuals from new and old immigrant communities. But
in this particular case, we really wanted to look at
communities whose stories hadn't been told in a deep and
(06:51):
rich way, and I think what Emma will talk about
is the nature of how we did this project was
really to have not only people telling their own stories,
but people collecting those stories who mirror the cultures that
are being explored.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
One reason that the Center wanted to do the Casting
a Wider Net project, in my understanding, is to build
local capacity for people to be able to tell their
own stories, particularly thinking about positionality. So the type of
interview that's going to happen if it's an English speaker
speaking with someone whose first language is not English, is
going to be very different than an interview that was
(07:27):
conducted in their home language and the language that they
felt most comfortable with. And likewise, the types of conversations
and the types of trust building that happen when you
know the person sitting in front of you asking the
questions has some visceral understanding of who you are, what
your experiences have been, whether it's because they share an
ethnic background, or a work background or a gender background,
(07:51):
is really important. And so I think you'll see in
the Casting Wider Net exhibit that some of the stories
that were able to be unearthed were stories that the
Center never would have been able to capture had we
not built in training for nine community ethnographers from these
communities to do the work themselves.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
So, yeah, talk to me about the process then of
pulling all these stories together, because obviously you had to
go find the people to tell the stories. What was
that like when you were literally casting the wide net
asking for these stories.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
So we began by actually building our cohort of nine
community ethnographers. We felt it was really important to pay
the community ethnographers a stipend despite the fact that they
were getting training, because it's really hard work to learn
how to interview and to transcribe interviews. So it began
with sort of putting a call out to the community.
(08:41):
And both Laura and I are deeply rooted in this community.
I've lived here my entire life, so in certain ways
we were able to draw upon our connection to this
place and personal networks. But put a call out asking
people who would be interested in being paid to learn
oral history techniques and interview people from the Cape Verdian, Vietnamese,
(09:02):
Central American, Puerto Rican, and Cuban communities with ties to
the commercial fishing industry, and the response was really wonderful.
We actually had to turn folks away. We didn't have
enough grant money to fund more than nine community ethnographer positions,
and so it was a shot in the dark in
some ways. We weren't sure what the response would be.
And I think that people are craving these types of stories.
(09:26):
They're craving the ability to build their capacity to help
tell those stories. And so our hope is that this
is just a pilot of a program that is replicable
and can be continued. Lots of people when we reached out,
said what about telling the story of Wampanog peoples? What
about telling the story of West Indian people? There are
(09:47):
so many different cultures and ethnic communities in the commercial
fishing industry, and I see this exhibit as just the beginning.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
In this era full of rhetoric about immigration and a
lot of people talking about the concept of immigration and
where we move forward as a country with immigration. So
many people come to this country to do these jobs,
these hard jobs like working in the fishing industry. Through
these stories, what have you learned? What have people been
telling you about their stories.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
One of the things that was not surprising, but it
was gratifying was something that Emma said before, which is
that people were more open I think in these situations
than they would have been had the interview or not
been from their culture. And people talked about a lot
of pretty touchy subjects and hardship to some extent. I mean,
there's a story of resilience that we like to point to,
(10:37):
but there's also a lot of people slogged through to
get here in the first place, to learn their job,
to get good at their job. Sometimes the job was
a stepping stone to get elsewhere. There's a lot of
pride I think among people for all that they've accomplished
in the fishing industry and just in the United States.
(11:01):
And we're also looking at you know, somebody from Puerto
Rico is a very different story than somebody from Vietnam
or somebody from Central America. Right, so the circumstances like
Vietnamese were refugees after the war, Puerto Ricans are citizens.
Central American people are often coming here in desperation without
you know, the different immigration status, and so that also
(11:23):
was when people see this. It's a very visual exhibit.
We worked with a local capabridy and photographer, but two
of the people don't have photographs, and Emma can maybe
articulate why that is.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
Yeah, I'd love to hear about that. Why is that?
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Yeah? So we had to think a lot about how
to one present oral history in an exhibit format, but
too how to present the stories of people who were
not comfortable being photographed due to citizenship citizenship status, and
we have landed on the idea that we really want
to draw attention to the absence of those photos in
(11:58):
a couple of the exhibit pannels, because undocumented workers are
a huge part of how the commercial fishing industry and
many of the industries that feed our country work, and
so we wanted to kind of put viewers in the
shoes of those folks and have them have an opportunity
to hear directly from people about why it is they came.
(12:22):
And hopefully this exhibit will help bridge some divides and
gaps and understanding between older, more established immigrant groups that
tend to dominate the commercial fishing industry and some of
the newer communities, specifically the Central American community, who have
become a large part of fish processing. And I think
(12:44):
there will be some interesting stories to think about. We
had some older Cape Verdian women who spoke about either
their own work in fish processing or their parents work
as first generation immigrants from the Cape Ford Islands. And
we also had people who are currently work or have
worked in seafood processing from the Central American community. And
(13:05):
so it's really interesting to see those similarities, and I'm
excited to see our community athnographers and our narrators start
to make some of those connections.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
So many hands touch the fish and then all the
stories that go along with those people who all have
a part in putting together our lunch or our dinner,
our lobster role when we're on vacation. And I really
appreciate the fact that you're kind of breaking this down
to show people the human side of an industry that
really I think, you know, you've got your TV shows,
your Deadliest Catch and stuff like that, but you don't
(13:36):
really hear a lot of talk about the fishing industry
unless it's like hollywoodized.
Speaker 3 (13:40):
Yeah, and you'll see there's a variety of shore side
businesses and jobs that are featured in the exhibit. So
we have a Cuban netmaker who works at Radars trial
and manufacturing. We have somebody who drove trucks. So the
people who transport your seafood from the boat to the
restaurant or to the auction, and we have people who
(14:01):
work as longshoremen, and people who talked about the previous
generation who worked as stevedores unloading offloading boats and now
offloading wind turbines as New Bedford's offshore wind industry takes hold.
Speaker 1 (14:16):
What so far has been the reaction from the museum
doing this in the first place? What are you hearing
about this so far?
Speaker 3 (14:22):
We gathered with our cohort of community ethnographers for three
trainings leading up to their interviews, and each training we
had food that was reflective of the cultures we were interviewing,
and it became a really communal atmosphere. And the first
time we met, I asked everybody how many of you
have been to the New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center before,
and almost no hands raised. So almost all of our
(14:45):
community ethnographers were interacting with the center for the very
first time through this project, and I recall Paula, one
of our community ethnographers, saying, Wow, this little center is
doing so much and it's so interesting to that you're
telling the story of working people. I don't see working
people on the walls of museums in this city. Or
(15:08):
frankly in the country. And so I think that was
a huge takeaway in a working class city like New Bedford,
to see that working people and their stories are valued
was definitely a take away.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Yeah. Sure, And what about you, Laura.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
So I would say the same. I mean, I think
that people who've been been here before and have been
following us. We've only been open eight years, so we're
you know, we're small, and we're new fish. But I
would say that people are starting to, I don't know,
to understand the breadth of the kinds of stories we tell.
I don't think that from the outside, if you hear
(15:47):
the word Fishing Heritage Center, your first thought is probably
not this exhibit or this kind of content.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
Probably right.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
And in fact, a lot of people who sort of
stumble in, you know, they've been to the National Park
or the Whaling Museum, some of the more dominant cultural attractions,
and they're on their way back to the parking garage
and they happen to see our sign and they come
in are usually really surprised to find out that there's
a way to learn about the contemporary fishing industry. You know,
they are sort of like, oh, I thought it was
(16:14):
all about history because it says heritage.
Speaker 1 (16:16):
Yeah, it's not all like spearing whales.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
I mean, there's a lot right going on so right exactly,
And for me, the word heritage really is a past
present future idea to continuum. I mean, are these are
people making history today? I guess this is one way
you could say it. But I think that people are
becoming more you know, sort of. It's not just a
room full of boat models. It really is stories about people.
(16:40):
It really is stories about people in your neighborhood, you know,
so it's very local. On the other hand, these are issues,
as you were kind of pointing to, that are national
and global. These are issues about migration and immigration. These
are issues about unions and labor. These are issues about
gender roles, these are issues about addiction in some cases
(17:01):
came up. So you know, these are many different issues
that the their stories about family, their story. In fact,
we have five themes that kind of run throughout the
exhibit that we kind of you know, pulled out of
sort of hearing common things over and over again from
different people. And in general, what I would say is,
when thinking about what I hope happens here, it's kind
(17:24):
of what Emma said, I really hope that people take
the time because it is you know, you need to
take the time to put in the little earphones and
listen deeply, and you know, I think what will happen
is you may sort of think I have nothing in
common with this person. They are so different from me,
their life is so different. And when you listen, I
(17:46):
hope that you actually realize that you have a lot
more in common than you thought.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
Many of us do. So, Emma, let's talk quickly about
the upcoming exhibit opening. You've got a big event planned
on the fourteenth. Tell us about somebody wants to come,
how they can get tickets, what they'll expect to see
when they get there, so on and so forth.
Speaker 3 (18:05):
So in the spirit of inclusivity, this is not a
ticketed event. It is completely free, open to the public
and anyone can drop in between six pm and eight
pm on Thursday, November fourteenth, which is ahah Night, a
night when downtown New Bedford comes alive with art, history
and architecture programming, all free and open to the public.
If you come on that night, you can expect to
(18:29):
one be able to experience the exhibit in full for
the first time to get to hear some testimonials from
our community ethnographers who conducted all of the interviews for
this project and talk one on one with them, and
three have a taste of some of the cultures that
are represented in the exhibit. So we're going to be
(18:49):
having some light refreshments, all from local restaurants or in
some cases cooked by by the people who are part
of this project who bring some cooking expertise. And then
one of our community ethnographers, Colleen, happens to be a
DJ as well as an interviewer and awesome culture bearer
in our communities, so she has created a playlist of
(19:11):
music drawing from all of the cultures that are represented
in the exhibit. So you can expect some music, some food, community,
and an opportunity to listen to the stories of all
fourteen people who were interviewed as a part of this project.
Check out an awesome introductory video created by our videographer
Lea Onifrey. And then there's an interactive element to the
(19:34):
exhibit as well, so people will have an opportunity to
reflect on how their own personal story connects to some
of the stories that they've heard or connections that they're
noticing between different narrators stories and as Laura was saying,
the interesting thing about the Center and this exhibit is
that it is so community centric and place based, and
so we wanted to play with that a little bit
(19:55):
in our exhibit and our exhibit opening. So there will
be a guestbook, and if people are particularly moved by
a story or resonate with or connect to someone's story,
they can actually write them a letter and that can
be sent to the person.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
So there is a little bit.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
Of interaction and back and forth, and there'll be a
little scrapbook of photos so that everyone can check out
the photos that were taken as part of this project
or collected because we have some archival photos from I
don't know how far back, but at least seventy years.
Speaker 1 (20:26):
That's incredible. Okay, there was a lot going on that
one night, but it's going to be worth it. And
I think it's important to note too, Laura, where is
the center, how do we get there all the basic
stuff and where can people find out more about this event?
Speaker 2 (20:41):
Sure? So, physically we are located at thirty eight Bethel
Street in downtown New Bedford. We're half a block from
the Whaling Museum and about half a block from the
one of the city garages on Elm Street. You can
find out more on our website, which is Fishing Heritage
Center dot org. We have a calendar of events and
links to more information about this particular project. I will
(21:04):
also say this is a kickoff event, right so November fourteenth,
this is the first day that the exhibit will be
open to the public. The exhibit will remain on display
here through the end of May, at which point the
plan is to travel at least components of it to
different community sites. So that's going to be exciting. And
then in the meantime, we're excited about ways to work
(21:26):
with local schools or any schools actually that might want
to engage with this, so schools, but also we will
have a lot of public programming, so films and cooking classes,
so potentially you can learn how to make some Vietnamese seafoods,
some capbirdie and seafood okay, And then you know other
kinds of programming like talks and tours and so on.
(21:47):
So we're very excited about the many different ways that
we can kind of dive deeper with the exhibit as
a Springboard for.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
Sure, and then of course on social media. I'm sure
you're going to be talking about this your website. That's
where people should go to keep in touch with all
the different elements I guess that are coming up in
the next few months.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (22:04):
Yeah, And all of the interviews will also be accessible
in the Center's archives, but also on Noah's archives.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Oh okay, yeah.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
So they'll be accessible there and you can check out
photos and the full transcript of each interview.
Speaker 1 (22:19):
Emma and Laura, thank you for your time on the
show and best of luck with the exhibit. Please have
a safe and healthy and happy weekend. Join me again
next week for another edition of the show. I'm Nicole
Davis from WBZ News Radio on iHeartRadio.
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