Please post a few lines about what arguments from the readings you are engaging with and the information that you are attempting to uncover from the Atlantic Slave Trade Database. Use this space to draft out your ideas. Here is the url for the books that I have on reserve at the library. http://tinyurl.com/hbxe4rk
I will offer you some feedback as well as three points on your last test grade if you have your post up before 10 pm Thursday night.
I plan on using Paul Lovejoy's publication on the Transformation of Slavery as the base of my paper. He believes that slavery in Africa was influenced by both external and internal forces and was therefore transformed over time. His study also takes a closer look where and when slavery became a central institution throughout the continent. I will be using the voyage database to look at where slaves seemed to be getting exported in the highest numbers over the centuries and what was going on in the regions at that time.
ReplyDeleteDo you think that it did become a central institution? This might be an interesting thesis idea, but you are making a very wide claim by adding 'throughout the continent'. Just stick to one region at one point in time to actually justify your argument. Use the database to pinpoint a particularly interesting number/place and go from there. Paul Lovejoy is just a base, don't get too caught up in what he is doing, just worry about what you can prove in 10 p[ages. You're on the right track...Keep it up!
DeleteI am looking into writing my paper on the slave trade within Africa. I am interested in Mungo Park's argument, which discuss the reality of slavery since the earliest period of African history; there has been regular markets where slaves were bought and sold. War, famine, and insolvency are the main cause of slavery.
ReplyDeleteI am also interest in P.E. Hair's exploration of the slave trade within Africa. He discusses how the enslaved people were taken from their homes and brought to the coast. He studies where the slaves came from, and groups them by the cause of their enslavement. He discusses a number of the reason of enslavement that we discussed in class: war, kidnapping, sold by relatives, debt, and judicial process. He uses a group of 179 to analyze the slave trade of all of Western tropical Africa. He uses information solely supplied by individual Africans, so I would be interested in finding a ship/voyage that goes along with this grouping of enslavement and home base.
Laura:
DeleteThese are primary sources and are really cool to use to base a paper but you need to do more than just describe what was going on, you need to develop some sort of argument. You might want to look some of the other slave narratives that I have on reserve, like Mary Prince and Baquaqua. Go see what they are saying about the markets and see if you can find an argument that way. This is great early thinking about the project! I like it!
I plan on looking further into Philip Morgan's discussion of "African Cultural Dynamics in the Americas". He argues that the communities of African slaves were too diverse to recreate a single African culture. Therefore, Africans in the New World participated in borrowing and innovation in terms of recreating their cultures. I am fascinated by the deep cultural connections thrived after Africans were ripped away from their homes. I plan to use the database to search where Africans were exported from and where they landed in the New World.
ReplyDeleteThis is a great topic, but make sure to only focus on up to three places. Any more than that and you will get bogged down in detail. Once you get your locations set, then you can start to do some research! This is a wonderful start!
DeleteI plan on using John Thortons argument from the reading and the book "Africa and Africans in the making of the Atlantic world, 1400-1800" on the Impact that the slave trade had on African politics and culture. My main argument would be proving that the slave trade had a much larger impact on culture and politics than it did on the African economic system. I would use the database to see how both of those factors affected the slave trade in terms of supply.
ReplyDeleteThe difference between culture and politics is sometimes hard to tell apart, so maybe you just want to focus on 'political culture' and then 'economic culture', so that way you can make an argument and then use one or two examples to help validate your thesis. The only issue is that you are going to have to really pin point a place with the database and figure out, exactly, what you are trying to say about politics and economics...Otherwise, excellent job, sir!
DeleteI will be using Eric Williams ‘Economics, Not Racism, as the Root of Slavery’ as the foundation for my paper. Talking about the slave trade, Eric says a racial twist has been given to what is an economic phenomenon. Eric argues that the slave trade had nothing to do with racism but had everything to do with economics. I will be trying to prove Eric Williams argument that the slave trade was business related and was not about race.
ReplyDeleteBut the justification of slavery had everything to do with racism. You need to be very careful with this argument and do not fall prey to the myth that slavery didn't need racism. What you need to focus on is how much and from where were people being taken and where were they going. Trace out some large groups and time periods. Check out White over Black, by Winthrop Jordan
DeleteLocation: Shelved At 'Main Library 4th floor
Call Number: E185 .J69 2012
Number of Items: 1
Status: Not Checked Out
Good start so far!
I repeat...do not make your own racist argument by accident. Racism was not initially a factor, but it became a HUGE justification as the trade went on...by 1650, slavery and racism are connected. Do not make the mistake of forgetting that.
DeleteI want to examine Walter Rodney's argument about the origins of slavery in the Upper Guinea Coast in conjunction with John Thornton's arguments about warfare in the same region in "Warfare in Africa: 1500-1800." I want to examine the effects of warfare on the slave trade and the Atlantic Slave Trade Database can be used as a source of information about the number and characteristics of slaves that left this region during or after times of conflict.
ReplyDeleteGood. Keep working.
DeleteI will be using Joseph Inikori argument from the reading which states that the firearm imports into Africa stimulated warfare to obtain the slaves paid for the weapons. In his reading he talks about England being a huge factor into the guns for slaves in the trade, but also recognizes that other European countries contribute to the same trading as the English. So I will do some research from Joseph Inkikori book in the library, other sources from the UGA library online, and the Atlantic-Slave Trade Database to back up Inkikori argument that slaves where obtained for weapons through warfare.
ReplyDeleteLook at his book on British Industrialization that is on reserve at the library. You need to use the database to pick a spot that you want to talk about, so use that to figure out where you can try to apply his model to see if it works. Good thinking!
DeleteI will be using Herbert Klein's argument that the profits obtained from the slave trade, as well as mortality rates during the voyages being lower than commonly believed. His argument would tend to discredit the idea that slaves were an extremely high profit item by themselves, as well as remove the idea that massive numbers of slaves died in the course of nearly every voyage. I will be attempting to support this argument by using the Slave Trade Database, as well as attempting to track down his original sources along with other outside sources to attempt to verify his claims, as well as attempting to determine if the argument holds in the period after the United States and Great Britain abolished the slave trade.
ReplyDeleteThey are both really good arguments, and I like the way that you have strung them together, with one helping prove the other. Very smart! A chronology is going to be best for you. You can go very big for this project and do the entire thing, you can narrow down to country, or you can narrow down to African locale. What ever you want to do is fine. Wonderful work, friend!
DeleteI am going to use David Eltis's Th cultural roots of African slavery to argue that how the price of labor effect the New World's economy. David argued that using of African slavery is not only for economic reason because enslaved Europeans is cheaper than African slaves. Also he suggested that exemption of enslavement Europeans was the reason for African slave trade. I will be using the voyage database to look the price and the population of white and black labor to support my argument.
ReplyDeleteI think that you can get very economic in this paper, Hongyang and it would be fine, but USE the database for your numbers and then find some correlating prices by doing some research on JSTOR. Check out this book for some good economic numbers to use....
DeleteAuthor: Higman, B. W., 1943-
Title: Slave population and economy in Jamaica, 1807-1834 / B.W. Higman ; with a new introduction.
Publisher: Kingston, Jamaica : Press, University of the West Indies, 1995.
Description: xx, 327 p. : ill. ; 23 cm.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 311-323) and index.
"First published in 1976 (see HLAS 40:2983), work is a masterful analysis of the dynamics of slave labor in the economic growth of early-19th-century Jamaica. Discusses various characteristics of slave and free-colored population including mortality, birth rates, manumission, distribution, and structure, as well as jobs performed on island as a whole. Contains excellent statistical tables and new introduction by author"--Handbook of Latin American Studies, v. 58.
Subject(s): Slavery --Jamaica --History.
Genre/Form: History.
Location: Shelved At 'Main Library 5th floor
Call Number: HT1096 .H53 1995
Number of Items: 1
Status: Not Checked Out
Good Job!
I will be attempting to uphold Klein's argument that profits from the slave trade were smaller than originally thought and that this resulted in slave ships putting effort towards making their slaves survive the journey rather than taking as many as possible. I can use records from the slave trade database on voyages and their slaves to determine whether this logistical theory can be upheld.
ReplyDeleteDon't try and uphold anyone else's argument, but find your own using their model. See what you can dig up in the database that will help you find a specific company or timeline where you can see Klein's thesis unfolding. This is a great project and I am interested to see where you can take it! I would also suggest looking up this book:
DeleteAuthor: Rediker, Marcus.
Title: The slave ship : a human history / Marcus Rediker.
Publisher: New York : Viking, 2007.
Description: 434 p., [16] p. of plates : ill., maps ; 24 cm.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 361-415) and index.
For more than three centuries, slave ships carried millions of people from the coasts of Africa to the New World. Here, award-winning historian Rediker creates a detailed history of these vessels and the human drama acted out on their rolling decks. Rediker restores the slave ship to its rightful place alongside the plantation as a formative institution of slavery, as a place where a profound and still haunting history of race, class, and modern capitalism was made.--From publisher description.
Subject(s): Slave trade --Africa --History.
Slaves.
Merchant mariners.
Race relations.
Location: Shelved At 'Main Library 5th floor
Call Number: HT1322 .R42 2007
Number of Items: 1
Status: Not Checked Out
I will be backing the argument of Eric Williams that the root of slavery was economics not racism. Using Williams book called "Capitalism and Slavery", I will be able to find different connections within the Slave Database to affirm his findings. I will also try to find out more about the monetary gains from the use of slavery in comparison to other methods.
ReplyDeleteThis is an ambitious project, so I want you to find one thing that is very specific to economics and racism in order to make an argument. You don't want to affirm his findings, but actually your own! You're just going to use his theoretical model. So figure out, exactly, how he is making his arguments and try to replicate that with a specific location from the database. I have faith in you, Solomon.
DeleteI will be backing the argument of Claude Meillassoux. Claude Meillassoux argues that in African societies there was a greater demand for female labor than male labor. with the absence of many males as a result of the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade, it was necessary economically for women to preform hard labor. Female slaves now could not only preform domestic tasks but also physical labor. Meillassoux claims the value of female slaves in Africa came from women preforming a greater number of tasks than men and working longer hours. As a result, in Africa female slaves were more numerous and more expensive than male slaves. I am using data from The Voyage Data Base regarding the number of male and female slaves sold across the Atlantic to differing countries. I am also backing the portion of Meillassoux’s argument where he argues that the sexual allocation of tasks determines the value of slaves in differing locations.
ReplyDeleteI love Meillassoux! He is so cool. I think that this sounds great Koey. Start by looking big and then see if you can shrink down to just a few, maybe three or four, examples that you can use from the database. This is a very promising start! Yay! There are plenty of sources in the readings that can help you with this, look through their footnotes, too!
DeleteI am going to be looking at the development of the Capitalist America. This involves looking at Eric Williams theory which has to do with the fact that slavery was less about racism and undermining black people, but was more about procuring the raw materials to begin the industrial revolution in the American colonies.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, the industrial revolution does not take off in American until the end of the 19th/early 20th centuries. So you should look at Britain, instead, if you want to take this line of argument. Take a look at some of the books on reserve, and be careful that you don't fall too far afield of Williams's analysis!
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