Many of these are not sea shanties, they are maritime-themed songs.

edit

A shocking number of these songs are not sea shanties. Sea shanties were, strictly speaking, tools written by sailors, for sailors, to coordinate groups of men laboring together in tasks aboard tall ships. Generally speaking, they began to be collected by music scholars during the American Civil War period; prior to that, shanties were passed on orally. Songs that sailors sang when off-duty were called fo'c'sle songs or forebitters, and were generally not shanties, though I've read that some work songs went back and forth from the fo'c'sle to the deck. Maritime themed songs are not designed to keep gangs of men working in rhythm together, but are strictly for entertainment. This is explained more broadly in my video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7AuTDc3-gnI&t=34s. All sea shanties are maritime songs, but not all maritime songs are sea shanties. I would advocate for a separate category to be created called, "Maritime Songs". Rugglesby (talk) 02:43, 3 July 2023 (UTC)Reply