Dr Olivia Swift

Dr Olivia Swift came to the Greenwich Maritime Institute (GMI) having completed an Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded PhD in Social Anthropology from Goldsmiths, University of London. Her PhD provided an ethnographic study of labour flexibility in shipping with a particular focus on maritime trade unions and most of her doctoral research was spent in a union-run village for seafaring families in the Philippines, although she also spent time aboard ship. Dr Swift’s new research at the GMI focuses on matters relating to seafarer welfare, particularly the social effects of maritime piracy on Filipino seafaring families and the impact of the Maritime Labour Convention on seafarers’ work and lives. She also conducts research on behalf of maritime non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and unions. Prior to her doctorate she worked as a dance critic, journalist and arts administrator.

Research/scholarly interests

• Maritime trade unionism
• Maritime piracy
• Global welfare
  
• Neo-liberal subjectivities and experiences of work
  
• Southeast Asian studies
  

Selected publications

Journal articles and book chapters

Swift, O. (Under review) 'Home-making on land and sea in the archipelagic Philippines' in T. King and G. Robinson (eds), At Home on the Waves: Human Habitation of the Sea from the Mesolithic to Today. New York: Berghahn.

Swift, O. (Under review) '"Looking for a horizon that's real in this sea that's fantasy": temporalities of land and sea in a changing global shipping industry', Economy and Society.

Swift, O. (2011) 'Making sense of the state from its margins' (review of Noboru Ishikawa's Between Frontiers: Nation and Identity in a Southeast Asian Borderland (2010), Singapore: National University of Singapore Press. In The Newsletter (58), International Institute for Asian Studies.

Swift, O. (2011) Developments in new technology and implications for seafarers’ welfare. International Committee on Seafarers’ Welfare.

Swift, O. (2011) Seafaring citizenship: what being Filipino means at sea and what seafaring means for the Philippines. Journal of South East Asia Research.

Swift, O. (2010) Dancing between disciplines: reflections on affinities between anthropology and choreography. Dance Theatre Journal, 3.

Swift, O. (2009) “Natural born” sailors? Reconsidering stereotypes of Filipino global seafarers, Ugnayang Pang-Agham Tao. Journal of the Anthropological Association of the Philippines.

Swift, O. (2007) The People’s Puzzle: Crosswords and Knowledge Politics. Goldsmiths Academic Research Papers: Goldsmiths, University of London.

Swift, O. (2007) Wwow! Two million pesos up for grabs! Wow! 30,000 hopeful contestants! Woah… 74 dead and more than 500 injured. Left Curve, 31.

Publications on the internet

Swift, O. 2011. Pirates at home, hostages abroad: piracy in the Philippines, Somalia and the academe. In: Piracy as Activism, special edition of Re-public. Available at: <www.re-public.gr>

Swift, O. 2010. Welfare on water: situating welfare beyond the state. In: Beyond the Market and the Welfare State, special edition of Re-public. Available at: <www.re-public.gr>