The Open Secret: Drugs and Fishing in Georgia
Faculty Mentor
Jennifer Sweeney Tookes
Location
Russell Union Room 2084
Type of Research
Completed
Session Format
Oral Presentation
College
College of Behavioral & Social Sciences
Department
Sociology and Anthropology
Abstract
Substance use and overdoes deaths have been disproportionally disrupting families and communities in rural America. Increasing rates of drug use in these areas can be traced to the outsourcing of blue-collar work to outside of the United States, which economically restructured these areas by decreasing the profitability of generational industries. This is the story playing out in Georgia’s commercial shrimping industry and the communities it used to support. This research uses qualitative data collected over the past ten years to understand the perceptions and impacts of drug use on Georgia’s shrimping community. Using a lens of critical medical anthropology, environmental risk theory, and understandings of risk this paper examines: how the laborious conditions of shrimping and lack of profit create an environment for drug use to occur, how the already declining industry navigates working with a dependent crew labor force, and how overdoes related deaths directly impact the future viability of shrimping’s future on the Georgia coast.
Program Description
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Start Date
4-23-2026 3:15 PM
End Date
4-23-2026 3:30 PM
Recommended Citation
Collins, Makala L., "The Open Secret: Drugs and Fishing in Georgia" (2026). GS4 Student Scholars Symposium. 251.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/research_symposium/2026/2026/251
The Open Secret: Drugs and Fishing in Georgia
Russell Union Room 2084
Substance use and overdoes deaths have been disproportionally disrupting families and communities in rural America. Increasing rates of drug use in these areas can be traced to the outsourcing of blue-collar work to outside of the United States, which economically restructured these areas by decreasing the profitability of generational industries. This is the story playing out in Georgia’s commercial shrimping industry and the communities it used to support. This research uses qualitative data collected over the past ten years to understand the perceptions and impacts of drug use on Georgia’s shrimping community. Using a lens of critical medical anthropology, environmental risk theory, and understandings of risk this paper examines: how the laborious conditions of shrimping and lack of profit create an environment for drug use to occur, how the already declining industry navigates working with a dependent crew labor force, and how overdoes related deaths directly impact the future viability of shrimping’s future on the Georgia coast.
