Sailing the Seas of Global Trade

Follow Harvard historian Maya Jasanof as she explores global trade aboard an 1100 foot cargo ship as it sails along some of the same trade routes ships have traveled for centuries.  In a story for Aljazeera America Jasanof says that she is interested in the "links between the globalized past and present."

Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" provides Professor Jasanof with what she calls "a rich if unconventional historical source." Conrad, she says, "described the beginnings of globalization as we know it today: a world in motion and increasingly financially, politically and culturally intertwined; a world in flux, shaken by new powers, technology and ideas; a world whose dynamics strikingly resemble those of our own."

Here's the ship she on which she will be traveling for four weeks.Check Aljazeera for updates and photographs from Professor Jasanof as she begins her travels.