Week 5: Slavery in the Caribbean and South America

In this week's readings, Davis focused on the growth of sugar plantations in South America, and he explained how they epitomized what slavery looked like in the New World; therefore, he addresses the origin of slavery.  In the second reading Burnard uses Thomas Thistlewood's journal to get a perspective of what the average white male experienced while being a slaveholder. Davis shows how the ideas and racism behind slavery existed hundreds of years before New World slavery, and he also addresses the similarities difference of the master-slave relationships between the Caribbean and South America and the New World.

   One aspect that I found interesting about the Davis reading was how he explicitly said that slavery was based on economics because in past readings he had only focused on the religious motivations. Davis says, "owners were economically motivated to maximize the productivity of workers who could not simply be fired or have their wages lowered"(104). Davis also argues that people used the idea of slavery as an "institution necessitated by the need to Christianize and civilize a 'savage people' from Africa"(106) as an excuse or disguise for there economic motivations. These readings made me wonder if it was purely economic for slavery from the 1500s to slavery in the New world or did the want to civilize a 'savage people' influence the growth of slavery. Which do you guys think had a greater influence on slavery and the treatment of slaves? 

   Burbard’s text offers in inside look at the life a white male living in Westmoreland. He reveals the barbaric approaches slaveholders took, and also describes how they were the norm for that time and place. It was interesting to see the transition from Thistlewood learning about medicines and cultures from the slaves to the violent treatment he had of them because that is what people believed what necessary. Burnard shows how the English-Americans went in order to civilize the Africans but in the end they were the ones committing barbaric acts.

   The two texts works off of and support each other very well, so I have a couple questions that I think could be interesting to discuss. First, Davis states that historians often argue whether is the master-slave relationship is semifeudal, seigneurial, or paternalistic, so which do you think it is?  And second, how did improvements in technology affect the treatment of slaves?  

Topic Selection for First Major Project

In order to give everyone more time to think about the two major assignment options, their theme, and what they'd like to pursue for their first project, we'll do our topic selection and refinement via the blog this week.

As a reminder, here are the descriptions from the Syllabus about the two major assignment options:

• Wikipedia Historiography Paper – Using the “View History” function of Wikipedia, students will write an 800–1000 word historiography of a Wikipedia page relevant to their subtopic. We will spend time in class discussing how to think about and trace the historiography of a topic, what to look for within this “View History” page, and collaboratively decide how this assignment should be evaluated.

• Thematic Primary Source Analysis Presentation – Drawing on their chosen subtopic, students will select one primary source document and put together a 5-7 minute presentation that interprets its significance in light of their theme and the document’s importance to the wider history of Atlantic slavery. Students will use a digital presentation tool (e.g. Prezi, iMovie, Educreations, VoiceThread, Keynote, and the like) of their choice to design, record, and share their presentations on the class blog. Along with each presentation, students will also need to submit a Chicago Style bibliography that cites the sources they used in their research. As with the Wikipedia Historiography Paper, we will collaboratively develop an evaluation for this assignment.

So, based on these two descriptions, please write in the comments which of these two options you'd like to pursue for the Oct. 15 due date and what specific topic (e.g. Wikipedia page or primary source) you'd like select. 

Remember that the theme each of you selected should help determine (and constrain) what primary sources or Wikipedia pages can serve as good ones for this topic. I'll work to offer commentary and feedback to each of your ideas so that you can effectively refine your topics and have a clear sense of what to examine and analyze for this first project.

As an additional resource, below are a number of primary source repositories that should be useful in terms of choosing a document for the second project. (These same links are also on the disclosure document, FYI).

Documenting the American South (UNC-Chapel Hill)                                 Voyages Transatlantic Slave Trade Database (Emory)                                             Samuel May Collection (Cornell) Library of Congress Internet African History Sourcebook (Fordham)

The Atlantic Slave Trade and Slave Life in the Americas (UVA) United States National Archives Gilder Lehrman Institute Biblioteca Virtual Nacional of the National Library of Portugal Europeana (EU)

Week 4 Post-Williams and Davis Ch. 4

This week’s readings discussed the roots of slavery. Eric Williams discussed the roots of slavery from an economic standpoint. Williams stated that “slavery caused racism, but economic motives, not racial impulses caused slavery” (2). William’s discusses the roots of slavery and points out that slaves came from numerous ethnicities and numerous religions, but the goal was always the same, to make a profit. Williams found that slave labor in the New World consisted of people who were “brown, white, black, and yellow; Catholic, Protestant and pagan” (2). Williams points out that because the slaves were of so many different ethnicities and religion, they could not have been the defining factors of the creation of slavery. Williams states that the first slaves were Indians, but they were found to not be suited for plantation style work based on the culture they used to live in, he then states that the Indian slaves were replaced by poor white servants. Slavery was a common punishment for poor white people and became an increasingly popularly used for of punishment. However, using white slave labor had some big disadvantages such as creating manufacturing conflict with England, and creating a desire for independence. White slaves or servants could also run away from the plantations much easier and they were more difficult to replace, they also expected land at the end of their service contracts. The Negro had a much more difficult time escaping and did not have a contract for land at the end of his/her servitude. This to me makes it seem like slavery was a racist structure, but William’s goes on to state that Negro slaves were simply used because they were cheaper and more effective workers and that the white servitude just set up for the Negro servitude. Do you think that based on this understanding of William’s reading that slavery was primarily due to economic reasons or racial reasons? Which came before which? How does this interact with last week’s reading?

Davis also discusses the roots of slavery, but he believes that race and religion played into the creation of slavery as primary factors. In one instance, Davis describes how “because black African slaves were so far removed from their places of origin, they were truly ‘nationally alienated’” (94). This national alienation provided the slaves with a disconnect which meant that they did not have the ability to interact with plantation owners and white society the same way white servants or slaves did. Davis also describes how poorly they were treated and how cruel the names were that they were called, indicating to me that he carries a belief that slavery has racist roots. Davis also indicates that due to the interconnectedness of white people in Europe due to religion, white people were no longer an option for slave labor. Do you find Williams’ or Davis’ argument to be more persuasive? I think I tended to find Williams’ to be more persuasive because I think economics preceded cultural and religious motives.

Eric Williams is a big deal...

...and not just because he's got on those great shades (image courtesy of Wikipedia, where else?)

While we read only a tiny snippet of Eric Williams's writing for this week's upcoming class, know that Williams's work has had a profound impact on the history of slavery in general.

His most important book Capitalism and Slavery (1944) explored with the driving forces of abolitionism and expands on the argument that you read this week. Moreover, the argument he put forward in that book has established a number of central questions in the history of abolitionism that shape many of the central debates in the field.

Here are a few brief summaries/reviews of the book and its argument:

• Dexnell Gervais Peters, 2007 essay
• Seymour Drescher, "ERIC WILLIAMS: BRITISH CAPITALISM AND BRITISH SLAVERY"

Oh, and Williams went on to serve as the first Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, proving that it is possible to do something with a history degree. 

Barbara Fields has a point...

Here's an "infographic" (I hope my scare quotation marks make clear my skepticism of using this term to refer to this image) from a publication that appears in seat-back pockets of flights on a major U.S. domestic carrier who-shall-not-be-named.

We could play the "which of these things is not like the other game" (a la Sesame Street), and in doing so, I think prove one of the major points that Barbara Fields made in this week's reading.


So, what connection do you see between this image and her argument?

(And as for the airline, if you guess Voldemort Air, you're right!)

Barbara Fields on Race

In light of this week's readings and Julia's thought-provoking post below, I thought I'd add a few video clips of Professor Barbara Fields talking about the issues of race and its social and historical construction.

Check these out if you're interested in hearing more about her thoughts on this issue, which she articulated in Racecraft, a book co-authored with her sister, Karen E. Fields.

Week 3: Inhuman Bondage (Chapter 3) and Fields' "Slavery, Race and Ideology in the United States of America"

This weeks readings grappled with the origins of racism and how it shaped interactions between the masters and the slaves themselves. Davis focuses on historical slavery to view the progression of racism and how it originated. A large portion of Davis’s text focuses on the biblical origins of the ideology. Many in the Antebellum South would use the “Curse of Ham” to justify the pain they were inflicting, yet the biblical passage itself never mentions the color of Ham or Canaan’s skin. This in itself begs the question of why individuals felt the need to justify this ideology when they were also using the labor of Caucasian slaves. Davis explores the change in European thought from one that often depicted Black people as equals and quick-witted (if dangerous), as was the thought process the case of the Romans, to one that viewed those with dark skin as, dimwitted, slow, and to some extent evil. Davis also looks at the origins of slavery in the context of racism. Examining how the institution changed over time.

In the reading “Slavery, Race and Ideology in the United States of America” Barbara Jeanne Fields presents a different perspective. She forwards the idea that racism as an ideology did not take hold before the institution slavery in the New World was created. Positing instead that it grew out of the inherent classism inherent in slavery. In Fields’ opinion slavery itself had to be the precursor to racism because without it the institution would have been quickly crushed. Fields also examines how the institution of slavery exists today, why do we still feel the need to differentiate an author from a black author. She applies this to how we deal with race today still evaluating it as a real difference rather than the social construction that it is. Throughout the reading I found myself asking the question of how today’s form of racism differs in theory from that of the antebellum south. Today we perilously attempt to avoid the subject while constantly re-engrain it in our society. This action leads me to question if to some extent today’s version of racism is different in action but not in form.