Libertalia, bokstavligen och bildligt talat? : En studie av Captain Charles Johnsons verks skildringar av Libertalia genom nutida historikers tolkningar

Sammanfattning: Piracy has a big mysterious stamp. In the west, we have a clear picture of the 17th and 18th century pirates through stories about prostheses, planks, parrots and eyepatches. These stories come from one source, Captain Charles Johnson's legendary work that addresses a large number of pirates and their lives on the seven seas. This study investigates how modern historians relate critically to Captain Charles Johnson's work and how they interpret his stories about the fictional pirate utopia, Libertalia. What are their purposes and what have they been affected by? By applying a social-constructive theory, the purpose of course becomes evident by seeing what truths these historians created and carried on and how Charles Johnson's work was used in history. Through a social constructive study influenced by source criticism of the works of Marcus Rediker, David Cordingly and Philip Gosse, their interpretations have been perceived as very different. The different historians seem to have their own personal agendas and perceptions and have through their expertise created perceptions and stories that may characterize future generations' perception of the golden age of the piracy and, in particular, their image of Libertalia as a fair society without rulers.   The researchers' source-critical approach varies from seeing Johnson's work as narrative stories for future generations to the fact that Johnson primarily had a profit interest in the authorship. These ideas, however, are something that the historians themselves have concluded and thus become part of the social construction we call reality, in which we exist.