Spr 2013

HIS/LAH 4930, sections 1D35 / 09D2
 
SLAVERY IN THE ATLANTIC WORLD

Enslaved Africans made up the great majority of transatlantic migrants (and the overwhelming majority of female migrants) who came to the Americas from Columbus’s time to the early nineteenth century.  Large areas of Africa were reorganized around the supply of this labor force.  Slavery flourished in colonies from Canada to Argentina and formed the foundation of society in most tropical and subtropical lowland regions. The wealth generated by slave labor tied together four continents in new networks of global trade that involved not just slaveowners and traders but farmers, manufacturers, and shipbuilders from New England to India.  Historians study slave societies, because they represent an extreme form of power relations, because of the multicultural complexity they created, and because they played an important role in the making of the modern world.

In this course we will be sampling a mixture of contemporary sources and classic historiography relating to the history of slavery in the Atlantic world between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries.  As one of the History department’s junior colloquia, the course gives students an opportunity to engage in discussion in a seminar format and  to work on their analytic and writing skills.

Course objectives: 1) to seek out the common characteristics of the institution of slavery, while exploring the range of experience it encompassed and its impact at the local and global level  2) to develop students’ ability to analyze critically historical problems and to debate the causes of historical change  3) to improve students’ speaking and writing skills.

TEXTS
David Northrup, The Atlantic Slave Trade (2nd ed.), and Alejo Carpentier, The Kingdom of this World (available from the university bookshop); James Walvin, Questioning Slavery (available as an e-book).  The other weekly readings available on-line through Gatorlink as UF Library e-books or via other electronic databases linked to this site and the reserve desk site (https://ares.uflib.ufl.edu/).

REQUIREMENTS
1) Attendance is compulsory: weekly participation in discussion accounts for 35% of your final grade. A medical certificate is needed to excuse absence.
2) Three 3<4-page reports [click], (due weeks 2, 9, and 12) (10% each).  Written work must be handed in on time to get a passing grade.
3) Oral presentation of draft term paper (10%).
4) Research paper 12-15 pages (25)%.

For discussion to work well, you must come to class well prepared.  Take good notes on your reading; prepare as if for an exam.

OTHER
Students area expected to familiarize themselves with the University’s honesty policy regarding plagiarism and use of copyrighted materials; and with University grading policy.  Those requesting classroom accommodation due to a disability must register with the Dean of Students Office and should see me at the beginning of semester.

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COURSE OUTLINE (subject to change)

Note: Library reserve will usually list articles in collective works by the author/title of the book/journal in which they appear, not the author/title of the article itself.

  1.  Introduction. 1/9
      Course requirements.  Slavery in the Atlantic World: an overview.
    Report due next class.

  2.  Why slavery?  Why Africa? 1/16
      Is it surprising that at the dawn of the modern era this archaic institution, long
      vanished from most of Europe, enjoyed such an extraordinary expansion in the
      Americas?  Why did it appear earlier and become more prominent in some areas
      than others?  How do the cases of the Iberian and North European powers differ?

David Eltis “Europeans and the Rise and Fall of African Slavery in the Americas” American Historical Review (Dec. 1993):1399-1423 {link}; Northrup 1-29; Walvin ch1-2; David Galenson, White Servitude in Colonial America, 117,141-177.

Report 1: Compare in your own words (3<4 typed pages) the arguments of Eric Williams [in Northrup] and David Galenson as to why African slaves replaced European indentured servants in the British colonies. Due in class today.

  3.  Slave Trade. 1/23
      Can we say how many Africans were transported to the Americas?  Who
      controlled the Atlantic slave trade? In what ways did it change during its 400-year
      history? What would enslaved Africans have found familiar and unfamiliar in the
      New World?

Northrup 31-100.

  4.  Impact on Africa. 1/30
      Why have historians disagreed so much about the slave trade’s impact on Africa?
      What types of influence should we look for?  What types of evidence are available?

Northrup 101-132; “Process of Enslavement” in John Thornton, Africa & Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 98-125.

  5.  Work. 2/6
      What sort of work was performed by which sort of slaves?  On what
      principles was slave society organized?  To what extent did labor determine the
      quality of slave life?

Walvin ch 3; Robert Fogel, Stanley Engerman, “Structure of Occupations,” from Time on the Cross, 38-43; "Status, Ethnicity, Occupational Structure" (click); Geggus, "Sugar and Coffee Cultivation," from Ira Berlin, Cultivation & Culture, 73-95; Eugene Genovese, “Life in the Big House” from Roll, Jordan, Roll, 327-365; Dale Tomich, “Fruits of their Labor” in Slavery in the Circuit of Sugar, 259-280; Jamaican plantation records from the Gale-Morant Papers (handout).

  6.  Treatment and Demography. 2/13
      How can historians assess the conditions of slave life?  In what ways did they
      vary through time and across the Americas? Why did the slave population of
      mainland North America early achieve natural growth, when most slave
      communities never proved able to reproduce themselves?

Eugene Genovese, "The Treatment of Slaves in Different Countries," in In Red and Black, 158-172; Genovese, Roll Jordan Roll, 3-7; demography [click] sheet, “Population Growth in Slave Societies”; Robert Fogel, Without Consent or Contract (1989), 29-33, 132-138; 123-129, 142-153; Michael Tadman, "The Demographic Cost of Sugar," American Historical Review (Dec. 2000) {link}; Esteban Montejo, “A Cuban Slave’s Testimony,” in Darien Davis, Slavery and Beyond, (1995) 11-28.

  7.  Culture.  2/20
    Which aspects of slave culture can be attributed to African influences?  What factors determined the incidence of African
    retentions?  In what ways have scholars differed in their opinions on this subject?

Walvin ch 8; Richard Burton, Afro-Creole, 1-12; Mintz & Price, Birth of African-American Culture, 1-22, 81-84 [UF Library e-book {link}]; Roger Abrahams, After Africa, 1-10, 77-83; Michael Gomez, “I Seen Folks Dissapeah,” in Exchanging Our Country Marks, 114-153 [UF Library e-book {link}]; R.F. Thompson, Flash of the Spirit, 103-111, 142-145; Philip Morgan, “Cultural Implications of the Atlantic Slave Trade” in Eltis, Routes to Slavery (and in Slavery & Abolition 18 (1997): 122-145); Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, ch.2  [UF Library e-book link].  Recorded music.
    Report due next class.

  
  8.  Gender and the Family.  2/27
      Did males and females experience slavery differently? How did females and
      males relate to each other under slavery? Was slavery incompatible with family
      life? Why have historians disagreed?

Walvin ch 6; Douglas Hall, In Miserable Slavery, 50-91 [click for background]; Orlando Patterson, Sociology of Slavery, 159-170; Higman, "African and Creole Slave Family Patterns" in M. Crahan, Africa and the Caribbean, 41-62; R. Fogel, Without Consent Or Contract, 162-186.

Report 2: Discuss the evidence in the Hall extract regarding gender difference and slavery (3<4 pages). Due in class today.

SPRING BREAK

10.  Accomodation and Conflict.  3/13
       In what ways did slaves show resistance to their enslavement?  What factors
       promoted the stability of slave societies?  Was there a slave personality-type?
       How important was marronage (running away)?

Walvin ch 4; Stanley Elkins, "Slavery and Negro Personality," in A. Weinstein, American Negro Slavery; John Blassingame, Slave Testimony, 532-543; "Runaway advertisements; slave satire," in Craton & Walvin, Slavery, Abolition & Emancipation,136-8; Geggus, "On the Eve of the Haitian Revolution" in G. Heuman, Out of the House of Bondage; Richard Price, Maroon Societies (1973), 1-30.

11.  Rebellion.  3/20

        Under what circumstances did slaves typically rebel?  Compare the different
        typologies of slave revolt that have been put forward.

We will watch the movie “La Última Cena” (The Last Supper) (110mins).
Walvin ch 7; Geggus,”The Causation of Slave Rebellions,” ch. 4 in Haitian Revolutionary Studies (e-book), pp. 55-68; Eugene Genovese, From Rebellion to Revolution, xii-50.
    Report due next week.

 12.  The Haitian Revolution. 3/27
        Why did the French colony of Saint Domingue produce the largest and most
        successful slave rebellion in the Americas?  Why did it lead to the creation of Latin
        America’s first independent state?

Geggus, ch.1, Haitian Revolutionary Studies, [UF Library e-book link]; Alejo Carpentier, The Kingdom of This World. This webpage (Haitian Revolution) may prove helpful.

Report 3:  What themes does Carpentier emphasize in his evocation of the Haitian Revolution? What is gained and lost in a novelistic account? Due in class today.

13.  The Atlantic Economy and Slavery.  4/3
    How important were American slavery and the slave trade within the international
        economy that developed during the Early Modern period?  What did they
        contribute to growth of capitalism or the Industrial Revolution?

D. Eltis, et. al, "Introduction" Slavery in the Development of the Americas, 1-27;  Kenneth Morgan, Slavery, Atlantic Trade and the British Economy, ch. 2, ch. 4;  Bergad, Cuban Slave Market,1-14, 143-154.

14.  Abolition. 4/10
       Why, for the first time in history, did public attitudes regarding the morality
       of slaveholding and its efficiency change dramatically in the later l8th century?
       Were these changes, or others, in the world economy, in the rebelliousness of
       slaves, in class relations in Europe, or in the fortunes of slaveowners, more
       important in bringing about the eradication of slavery?

Walvin ch 9-10; Northrup, 133-148, 167-200; D.B. Davis, Problem of Slavery in the Age of Revolution, 39-83 (library e-book link).

15.  Presentations. 4/17
        Oral presentation (10 minutes presentation; 5 minutes discussion) of your term paper project.
        Half of you will give your presentation this week.   

16.  Presentations. 4/24
        The other half will give your presentation this week.

      Friday, 5pm, week 16: Hand in completed term papers, revised in the light of class discussion and my comments.

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