Slavery in America

1
Slavery in America

• From Colonial America
• to Antebellum U.S.

2
Earlier Forms of Slavery

• Slavery existed in many places and forms
  throughout human history Greeks, Romans, Slavs,
  Muslims, Africans, Europeans
• Differed from place to place, time to time
• Majority of slaves before Atlantic Slave Trade
• Slaves captured in wars (POWs)
• Payment for debts (could sell self into slavery)
• Usually temporary situation, at least
  generationally (status of slave not inherited
  from parents)
• Ways of gaining status for some slaves (some
  social mobility)
• African slavery existed before Atlantic Slave
  Trade
• POWs, agricultural work, some soldiers, some
  gained high status
• Most were of low status or debtors
• Could marry non-slaves, children were free

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Environmental And Geographical Variety of Africa
4
Spread of Islam in Africa up to Middle Ages
5
Trade Across the Sahara

• Trade brought west African societies into contact
  with Berbers, Arabs, other African tribes
• The importance of camels necessary to cross
  desert
• Huge camel caravans to west Africa
• West African rulers and kingdoms converted to
  Islam used Islamic law, institutions, and
  writing
• Link to Trade and Spread of Islam in Africa (Art)

6
Islam Slave Trade

• Muslim demand for slaves of all races not
  religious, for political power and wealth
• Variety of uses for African slaves for
  household, military, and labor
• Different than Atlantic slave trade which was
  racially- and plantation-based
• Slave caravans from west Africa across Sahara
• Muslims also traded in slaves from east Africa
  coastal ports on Red Sea and Indian Ocean carried
  slaves from African interior

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Empires of Medieval Africa
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West African Kingdoms Ghana

• Ghana land of gold
• Strong kingdom before Islam
• Controlled trade of gold salt
• Berber traders converted elite to Islam
• Then Berbers adopted militant form of Islam
  followers were called Almoravids
• Conquered Spain, converted Ghanaians
• Art of the Almoravid Period
• Trans-Saharan Gold Trade

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West African Kingdoms Mali

• Mali (1200-1450 CE)
• Mandinke People
• Successor to state of Ghana
• Upper Niger River
• Good agriculture lots of rainfall
• Strong Rulers Sundiata, Mansa Uli,
• Mansa Musa
• MM Pilgrimage to Mecca 1324 CE
• Very rich powerful visited
• kings of other nations
• Timbuktu became center of
• learning culture (p. 134)

Mosque in Djenne (Mali)
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Empire of Mali (1200-1450 CE)
11
Ife West African Bronzes

• 12th-15th-century CE
• Symbols of power and religion
• Connection with spirit world
• Power of kings
• To reach spirits
• Over people
• Link to images
• Link to videos

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Effects of trade on West Africa

• Connections to other cultures
• Spread of Islam
• Slave trade
• Growth of African merchant class and cities
• Consolidation of kingdoms to control trade
• Power used to control trade and people enslaved
  non-Muslims and unprotected
• Example, Ife bronzes show kings AND captives

13
European Exploration Labor Systems

• Colonization Empires based on exploitation of
  native and African populations
• Spanish system encomienda labor system mining
  and agriculture by natives (slaves/serfs)
• Portuguese, French, and English enslavement of
  Africans
• Creation of plantations in Caribbean, No. and So.
  Americas to grow staple crops sugar, coffee,
  tobacco, cotton
• Racial system of slavery eventually developed
  Europeans rationalized only blacks could be
  slaves

14
Slave trade transported slaves throughout
Atlantic World majority of slaves outside U.S.
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Atlantic Slave Trade

• Europeans tapped into existing slave trade in
  Africa
• Atlantic slave trade increased demand for slaves
  exponentially
• Atlantic demand dramatically intensified and
  expanded slave trade within Africa
• Slave trade greatly affected African societies
• Increase power of kings and elites
• Created new trader elite on coast multilingual,
  multi-ethnic, married Europeans, mixed-race
  children
• Affected political boundaries and states
• Led to increased warfare and slave raids,
  conducted with Euro. guns
• Created thousands of refugees
• Created African dependence on foreign goods,
  preventing indigenous economic development still
  seen today

17
Slavery and Industry

• Often people think of slavery and
  industrialization as two separate processes
• But there are major links and connections
• Time periods
• Goods
• Methods of production
• Machinery
• Methods of labor control
• Emphases on efficiency and productivity
• European middle classes involved in both
  merchants, bankers, shipping, plantation owners
• Slavery and industrialization connected in major
  ways reinforced each other, affected the
  development of each other

18
Slave Captives

• Slaves were usually captured by African slave
  raiders
• In early years of Atlantic trade, kings or
  traders sold slaves that were on hand
• As trade deepened and expanded, demand for slaves
  increased, and raiders had to go further into the
  interior for supplies of slaves
• Usually went up one of the major rivers in canoes
• Raided villages
• Link to clip of slave capture from the film
  Amistad
• Raiders took slaves to coastal forts or factories
  run by Africans or mixed-race trading families
• Slaves were usually kept in pens on the beach
• Many slaves died en route to forts and on beaches
  before ever setting sail for the Americas

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African Slave Factory on African Coast
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West African Slave Fort or Factory
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Tools of the African Slave Trade
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Slave Fort and Boats
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Slave Fort, Ghana, 1973
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Slave Ship
Middle Passage efficient and controlled
transportation of goods AND murderous
enslavement and exploitation of fellow humans
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Below-decks of Slave Ship, 1845
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Atlantic Slave Trade, 1701-1810
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Cuban Sugar Mill
Slavery and Industry use of new technologies,
machinery, labor control for more efficient
production of consumer goods
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Sugar Plantation
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Sugar Mill
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The Merchant Ship Industrial?

• A factory at sea
• Discipline
• Control
• Hierarchy
• Economic profit
• Engaged in Atlantic trade

31
Consumption, Production, Finance

• Relationships between new forms of industry and
  new forms of consumption
• New forms of popular consumption fueled and
  reinforced the development of industrial
  production slave and free
• New forms of banking, finance, insurance to fund
  and secure Atlantic trade
• Examples sugar plantations, rum, coffee, tea,
  tobacco, cotton
• Conclusion most inhabitants of the Atlantic
  world were connected to slave systems in some way
  not equal ways, of course

32
The Coffee Housemeeting place, banking,
dealing, consumption
33
New Forms of Consumption

• Cheap sugar, textiles, guns, rum
• Not just for royalty anymore
• Growing middle-class conspicuous consumption
• Cakes, sugary treats, for example
• But also working-class consumption
• Coffee houses places to talk politics
• Sugar cheap calories for factory workers
• Cheap goods for Atlantic Trade
• New consumption patterns tightened relationships,
  both positive and negative

34
North American Slavery

• Distinctions
• General differences between North American and
  Caribbean/South American slavery
• Differences by size of plantation
• By region northern slavery, upper vs. lower
  south, western slavery
• By crop tobacco, rice, sugar, coffee, cotton
• Changes over time (for example, after Am.
  Revolution after end of Atlantic slave trade
  after LA Purchase)
• Link to clip on slavery in the Carolinas (from
  the PBS series, Slavery and the Making of America
  (2005)

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Slaves in the Original Thirteen Colonies
(1750-1860)
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Slaves as Percentage of Southern Population
(1750-1860)
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Slaves as Percentage of Southern Population
(1750-1860
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Pirates

• What do pirates represent?

Link to National Geographic article
on Blackbeards ship, recent archaeological work
on the underwater wreck
Blackbeard the Pirate
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Blackbeard and North Carolina

• Blackbeard hijacked French slave ship La Concorde
  off Caribbean island of Martinique set slaves
  free
• Ship had been used for at least 3 slaving
  voyages, around 500 slaves each
• 61 died on Middle Passage on last voyage
• 16 crew members also died
• Blackbeard plundered ships in triangle and
  Atlantic/Caribbean trade

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Atlantic Resistance to Power?

• At their most radical
• Pirates represented rare form of interracial
  lower-class solidarity
• Whites, blacks, and people from all over the
  Atlantic fought Atlantic industrial and slave
  systems together
• But.white resistance to power, authority, and
  exploitation usually took other forms
• Problem of racism - usually divided white
  working-class from slaves and free blacks in
  Atlantic world
• White workers defined themselves as not slaves
• Whites gained prestige, small level of comfort
  consumption, wages for not being slaves

41
Popular Resistance

• There were a variety of popular responses by
  people around the Atlantic in times of economic
  change
• During feudalism (peasants vs. lords)
• Reused during transition to industrial economy
• Used to attack or undermine authority of masters
  (of different kinds slave masters, industrial
  owners, middle class)

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Mumming and Masquerade
Mumming was tradition of masquerade in feudal and
modern Europe Usually around harvest or
Xmas time A night when it was ok to challenge
lords or masters authority Lord or
master expected to share wealth or abun-dance,
the treat
Mummers showing up at the masters door
43
Luddites in England
Luddites reused tradition of popular local
protest and masquerade to protest new industrial
system Luddites smashed new industrial factories
and machines to protest control and power of new
industrial system Often worked at night, in
masks, costumes, under cover of darkness Signed
protest letters as Ned Ludd
44
Modern Mumming in Philly
Modern Mummers Day Parade in Philadelphia every
New Years Day
45
History of Public Resistance and Performance

• Context of owner surveillance and control
  attempts to limit gatherings in groups, fear of
  slave revolt
• Slaves, free blacks, post-slavery black Americans
  cele-brated Emancipation Day as reminder of
  continued fight for racial, social, and economic
  equality
• Claiming public sites or spaces when they did not
  have any formal power or rights
• Examples
• John Canoe or Jonkonnu
• Pinkster and Negro Election Day
• Public religious, political, musical expression
• Often poked fun at whites through dress and
  mimicry

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Everyday acts of resistance What are they
talking about?
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Slavery in Age of Revolution

• Revolutionary and Enlightenment beliefs had great
  impact on slaves and slavery
• Ideas of liberty, freedom, equality, natural
  rights circulated throughout the Atlantic world
• Adam Smith free labor and markets are best
• Lord Dunmoore slaves would be freed if they
  fought for Brits during Am. Revolution
• Some upper south owners freed slaves after Am.
  Revolution
• Northwest Ordinance, 1787 slavery banned from
  NW territory
• Gradual Emancipation in northern states in late
  18th- and early 19th centuries

50
Frederick Douglass and the Slave Experience

• In what ways did Douglass resist the power of
  slaveholders and slave society?

51
Resistance Atlantic Abolitionists

• Britain developed strong abolitionist movement
• Quakers in 18th and 19th centuries
• William Wilberforce and reformers in Parliament
  British slave trade abolished, 1807
• Abolition of slavery in colonies, 1830s
• Strong working-class support for abolition,
  despite fears of textile unemployment
• British if they could abolish slavery, then it
  was right thing for U.S. to do
• Advocated free trade and free labor instead
  of slave labor
• Critics of free labor said it wasnt truly free
  either

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Close-up of Painting
Comments?
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Possible Student Selection
Student Comments
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Abolition Common White Fears

• For most whites, abolition was scary
• It raised questions and fears about ex-slaves
• Are blacks capable of being free?
• Can they live peacefully with whites?
• Will they work if not forced to? assumed they
  were naturally lazy
• Will they work for wages?
• Will they assimilate into society?
• Fears of sexual relations with whites racial
  mixture

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French and Haitian Revolutions

• Circulation of revolutionary ideals throughout
  Atlantic
• Impact of French Rev. on slaves in Haiti and
  other Atlantic slave societies
• Haitian Revolution, 1791-1804 only successful
  slave revolt
• Haitian Revolt and Republic inspired slaves
  throughout Atlantic
• Struck fear in whites worst possible outcome in
  white minds

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Effects of Issues of Slavery and Wage Labor in
the Atlantic World?
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Zombies!

• What is a zombie?
• Dead, but alive
• Disguise of zombie
• Group of zombies mass conformity
• Mindless, speechless
• Created by some kind of disaster
• Consciousness being conscious vs. loss of
  control

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Zombies Atlantic Radicals?

• Product of Atlantic economic, social, and
  cultural history and connections
• Loosely based on West African and Haitian vodun
  (voodoo) religious practices, combined with
  Christian and other influences
• Africa Caribbean Britain U.S. World
• Stories and myths - critical of power, control,
  loss of freedom
• Began under slavery
• Emancipation as evolving issue new forms of
  power and control wage labor, colonialism, Jim
  Crow,.

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Film, White Zombie, 1932

• Meaning?

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Fela Kuti, Zombie, 1977

• Nigerian Afrobeat musician
• Influenced by U.S.
  Black Power movement
• Anti-colonial activist
• Activist for Nigerian democracy, against govt.
  repression

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Michael Jacksons Thriller

• What is the message of Thriller?
• How does Thriller deal with white fears?

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Image of Integration The American Dream
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Image of Integration Public Culture
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Image of Religious MysteryBlack Christianity
and Folk Traditions
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Image of Black Urban Culture Street Performance
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Major Issues that Defined Atlantic World

• Control and discipline of workers (slave and
  free)
• Production for profit
• Control of time
• Control of space
• Movement and trade of primary resources in
  exchange for finished industrial goods
• Growth of middle classes in ports and industrial
  centers
• Growth of working-class/slave populations

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Connections

• New forms of power, control, and profit in the
  Atlantic World
• Connections between slavery and industrial
  capitalism
• Popular forms of resistance to power and economic
  exploitation
• Wage labor developed within context of Atlantic
  Economy and African enslavement wage workers
  compared to slaves
• Possibilities of cross-racial resistance
• Problems of white fears of loss of control and
  power (slavery)
• Emancipation movements and continuing importance
  of issues of race, power, freedom in Atlantic and
  world history