Journeying through History

Students who produce outstanding scholarly work are nominated for a semester award. In this series, we look at a few examples to show what makes an excellent thesis, how it can benefit teaching, what motivates students to produce outstanding work, and how they are supported and guided by teaching staff.

Navassa is a tiny island that doesn’t even appear on most maps of the Caribbean. But in 1899, it was the location of an event that would change the relationship between the United States and its quasi-colonies on remote islands forever. During a violent rebellion by laborers who were digging up guano fertilizer on the island, a number of their overseers were killed. The rebellion on this remote island was the subject of widespread discussion among the American public at the time and this shed a spotlight on the social costs of mining.

Guano was a vital resource, a nutrient-rich fertilizer derived from the excrement of seabirds and bats. From the mid-19th century, this had resulted in a real rush to guano islands, a development that required hard physical graft by laborers.

There was good reason for the rebellion on Navassa, as Bachelor’s student Vivianne Rhyner discovered while conducting research for her term paper as part of her history degree, because the working conditions on the island were inhumane and dangerous to people’s health. “In the 19th and early 20th century, the demand for fertilizer really skyrocketed in Western countries,” explains Rhyner. Particularly large reserves were located on the islands in the Pacific and the Caribbean, including on Navassa. What historical, social and economic repercussions this great demand for fertilizer had was the research question that she wanted to answer in her term paper.

She first encountered the topic in the Mapping Pacific History seminar given by Jonas Rüegg, who is a senior teaching and research assistant in the Department of History. “Fertilizer obtained from guano is an important topic in the history of the Pacific because it represents one of the resources that led to processes of colonization, migration of labor and destruction of the environment in Oceania,” says Rüegg. “When Vivianne came across Navassa for her term paper, at first I myself didn’t actually know where this was, but the history of the island really helps to portray the picture of the guano rush in the Pacific. Vivianne came up with the topic for her paper herself and researched it in great depth. She independently analyzed both primary and secondary sources and adopted a critical stance in examining the use of fertilizer from an economic, social and ecological perspective.” Recognizing this particularly original and interdisciplinary work, Rüegg says that Vivianne Rhyner thoroughly deserved to receive the semester award.

When she was studying source materials, Vivianne Rhyner focused on the reports in the USA that chronicled what happened as it was viewed at the time. “I read a great deal and ultimately I chose to use the articles from newspapers as my primary sources,” says the history student. The texts describe how 130 laborers from Navassa Island were arrested after the rebellion and taken to the USA. But how was it that former slaves and other laborers on the Caribbean island, which did not actually form part of the territory of the USA, had to work on the island?

“The reason was the Guano Islands Act of 1856,” explains Rhyner. “This act permitted US citizens to take possession of islands in international waters if they contained guano deposits.” The team of lawyers representing the accused laborers back then contested the constitutionality of the Guano Islands Act. They argued that Navassa Island did not belong to the United States and the laborers therefore could not be tried under American law. However, the Supreme Court upheld the validity of the act, which reinforced the USA’s territorial claim to the guano islands and confirmed the sentences handed down to the laborers.

“This point clearly illustrates the intertwining of the needs of the economy and law that drove the territorial expansion of the USA here and elsewhere,” says Rhyner. The articles also gave the student a sense of the inhumane conditions under which the laborers working on Navassa had to graft away.

The sources threw up lots of interesting questions. “In the end, however, you need to choose certain primary sources and follow the path you’ve set out on,” says Rhyner. She knew the rules that need to be followed when writing a history term paper: the length of the paper, citing sources correctly and showing a clear methodology. “I felt confident working with sources, literature and doing research, but the challenge was to find a suitable way to present the material in order to make it coherent and academically correct,” says Rhyner.

“From an educational point of view, we are very keen to give the students as much freedom as possible when they write their term papers,” explains Jonas Rüegg. The aim of a Bachelor’s study program is to learn how to work with sources on your own. “The study of sources is open-ended – so the students have to embark on an intellectual journey whose destination is unknown,” says Rüegg. You need to be able to contend with this openness. And at the same time, you must constantly think about which further steps will be beneficial, which aspects you want to delve deeper into, what you want to abandon and whether you need to tweak the original question you asked. “I encourage my students to draw a mind map because this visual depiction often helps provide fresh insight,” explains the senior teaching and research assistant in the Department of History. For example, Vivianne drew a map of the island, and this gave her a sense of its size and the local conditions on the ground. She also shared her insights with the other students in the course and discussed her work with them.

However, a term paper should not just be planned in a quiet little room, says Rüegg. The senior teaching and research assistant is also keen for the students to engage with one another – just as Vivianne Rhyner did. “This helps them to reflect on their own work and overcome any barriers in their imagination.”

In writing her term paper, Vivianne Rhyner learned how to handle freedom and uncertainty. As soon as she finished writing the paper, she began an internship at the Swiss Consulate in New York. “One of my first tasks was to write a speech for the ambassador, and I had hardly any pointers to follow. The experience I’d gained from writing my term paper really helped me: I’ve learned how to set my own priorities and build a strong argument,” she says. She is now highly motivated as she works on her Master’s degree in International Relations at the Geneva Graduate Institute.