The ship as home: homemaking practices amongst Filipino seafarers at sea

Abstract

The complexities that attend global mobilities have shown us how migrants recreate home by drawing from their countries of emigration and immigration. In so many ways, any homemaking practices are embedded in home’s mobile and sedentarist aspects. Amongst overseas Filipino workers (OFW), this means the performance of Filipino traditions like fiestas, and consumption of Filipino food whilst at the same time learning the language of their destination countries and partaking of their cultural and social practices. Filipino seafarers, however, present us with an interesting case: they perform homemaking practices within the constrained and limiting spaces of the ship where they both work and live. Filipino seafarers have a transportable home ready for unpacking and reconstruction on every ship that they board, drawing less on what the ship offers, but more on what reminds them of home back in the Philippines. Drawn from data gathered from more than a decade of engaging with seafarers on board ships and ashore, this article focuses on the homemaking practices of Filipino seafarers viewed as a means to meaning-making, where ships conceived as non-places could be turned into home, and seafarer wellbeing is specifically defined as self-preservation on board and continuing authority back home.