Villainous Pirate Research Paper

In popular media, a pirate is often viewed as violent and anarchical, never truly caring about who or how they hurt someone. This idea of a villainous pirate is often generated through fictitious or cautionary tales of pirates that are passed through society. This is not always the case though since, despite the case of pirates having these violent tropes associated with them, they are also able to manipulate the lexicon to give this persona and use it to recruit men. Through this manipulation of the lexicon, which the dictionary is able to show, the men are able to use regular seafaring phrases and commands to their benefit while also painting a picture of animalistic and warlike behavior into how they viewed by the people of the time and

The words such as “pillage”, “booty”, “swag”, “black spot” and at times “privateer” all have dark and criminal meanings behind them. Words such as “pillage”, “booty”, or “swag” deal with the idea of stealing and perhaps even violence associated with the taking of goods through illegal means. The phrase “black spot” is a death warning, forewarning the receiver the fate that looms upon them and is often seen with the use of pirate captain and their disposal from their position. The word “privateer” is the act of piracy against an enemy nation, which would often strike fear into the victim's crewmen when they see these ships approaching. Pirates would often see themselves as privateers, either from losing their letter of marque and are now deemed pirates despite the crew's belief or the idea that they are helping their home nation but are not recognized as doing so in this exact moment. Regardless whether the crew contains this idea of being a privateer or a pirate, all of these words still contain a violent, animalistic, and warlike danger to them. The dark nature which follows these words is able to show how the men abroad and off the ship could have a fear brought upon them with the slightest mistake. The phrase of “black spot” is typically given to men in the counterculture and even one grave misstep or angering the wrong person can have a man in this culture receiving this warning. The people who are not in this counterculture are only able to view the negative and destructive of piracy, they are only able to view the pillagings and the violence associated with their actions instead of the positive ideas that are seen in pirating, an example being the phrase “no prey, no play” which shows the democratic and fair nature that is present upon the