HIST241: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, 1500-1865

Michaelmas 2018
Dr. Nick Radburn
Module Handbook
Course Convener:

Dr. Nick Radburn

Email: n.radburn@lancaster.ac.uk
Telephone: 01524 592769

I specialize in the history of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade with a particular

focus on the merchants involved in the business, and the ways in which those
merchants’ decisions shaped the experiences of the enslaved Africans who
they bought and sold. I am a co-manager of Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave
Trade Database; another digital database of British slave trading merchants;
and a project that is digitally rendering a French slave ship. My research and
digital work inform my teaching on the history of the trans-Atlantic slave
trade and I will include them throughout this module. Prior to moving to
Lancaster, I lived in the United States for seven years, an experience that
exposed me to the modern legacies of the trans-Atlantic slave trade—a
theme that we will explore in this module.

Cover: A View of the [Bristol slave ship] Blandford Frigate, c.1760.

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 Contents
Learning Outcomes ................................................................................................................................................................................. 4
Course Format .......................................................................................................................................................................................... 5
Course Readings ....................................................................................................................................................................................... 5
Class Schedule ........................................................................................................................................................................................... 6
Electronic Devices Policy ....................................................................................................................................................................... 6
Office Hours ............................................................................................................................................................................................. 6
Student Responsibilities .......................................................................................................................................................................... 7
Assessment ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 8
Recommended Books.............................................................................................................................................................................. 9
Lecture 1: Introduction and Ancient Slavery .................................................................................................................................... 10
Lecture 2: The Old World Slave Trade .............................................................................................................................................. 11
Lecture 3: Iberian Expansion and the Origins of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, 1492-1600 ................................................ 12
Lecture 4: Caribbean Sugar and the Growth of the Slave Trade, c.1600-1700 ........................................................................... 13
Lecture 5: Race, Gender, and African Slavery .................................................................................................................................. 14
Lecture 6: The Organization of the Slave Trade in Europe ........................................................................................................... 15
Lecture 7: The African Slave Trade .................................................................................................................................................... 16
Seminar 1: The Sale of Slaves on the African Coast ........................................................................................................................ 17
Lecture 8: The Slave Trade’s Impact on Africa ................................................................................................................................ 18
Lecture 9: The Middle Passage ............................................................................................................................................................ 19
Seminar 2: Slave Resistance and Rebellion on the Middle Passage ............................................................................................... 20
Lecture 10: The Sale of Enslaved People and the Inter-American Slave Trade ......................................................................... 21
Lecture 11: Plantation Labor in the Americas .................................................................................................................................. 22
Seminar 3: Slave Life in the Americas ................................................................................................................................................ 23
Lecture 12: Slave Culture in the Americas ......................................................................................................................................... 24
Lecture 13: North-west England and the Slave Trade .................................................................................................................... 25
Seminar 4: The Slave Trade’s Impact on Lancaster ......................................................................................................................... 26
Lecture 14: The Slave Trade and British Economic Development .............................................................................................. 27
Lecture 15: The Abolition of the Slave Trade in Britain and the United States, 1783-1807 .................................................... 28
Seminar 5: The Abolition Debates in Britain .................................................................................................................................... 29
Lecture 16: The Haitian Revolution and French Abolition, c.1791-1804 .................................................................................... 30
Lecture 17: Coursework Essay Writing .............................................................................................................................................. 31
Lecture 18: Second Slavery and the Illegal Slave Trade, 1808-1849 ............................................................................................. 32
Lecture 19: The Ending of the Slave Trade, 1849-1867.................................................................................................................. 33
Lecture 20: The Memory and Legacies of the Slave Trade............................................................................................................. 34
Appendix I: Essay Writing Guidelines ............................................................................................................................................... 35
Appendix II: Primary Source Databases ............................................................................................................................................ 36

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 Learning Outcomes
This module exposes you to the 350 years history of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, a
business through which 12.5 million enslaved Africans were forcibly transported to the
Americas—the largest forced migration in history. We will first see how slavery
diminished in Europe during the late Middle Ages, just as Europeans began to
systematically explore the Atlantic basin. We will then study the rapid expansion of the
trade after Columbus’ voyages, as Europeans enslaved increasing numbers of Africans
to work in the fields and mines of the Americas. Focusing on the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, we will look closely at how the trade operated, and how Africans
experienced their enslavement. We will also study north-west England’s connections to
the slave trade by investigating how Liverpool and Lancaster merchants outfitted slave
ships and profited by the trade, and the slave trade’s influence on the region’s economic
development. In the penultimate section of the module, we will see how the slave trade
was abolished in the early nineteenth century, and the persistence of a clandestine trade
until the end of the American Civil War. We will conclude by looking at the memory of
the trade and its modern legacies.

You will not only gain an in-depth knowledge of one of the most important phenomena
in world history, but also a sense of the ways that historians have studied the Trans-
Atlantic slave trade. In a series of seminars, you will analyze and contextualize a variety
of primary sources to access the history of invisible people in the past—enslaved
Africans—and what we now call the “third world”—Africa, the Caribbean, and South
America. The seminars will also help you to craft arguments on controversial themes,
helping you to develop your presentation skills. Through your reading of primary and
secondary sources, you will develop important analytical skills that will improve your
ability to read historical and contemporary documents. The lectures for this course rely
extensively on Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, and you will consequently
be introduced to the use of digital methods to study the past. These are all key skills for
historians, and they will prove useful as you pursue upper level courses and your later
careers outside of the University.

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 Course Format
Each week I will deliver two one-hour lectures. In weeks four to eight we will also
convene in seminar groups, led by myself. The lectures will introduce and explain events
and themes in the history of the trans-Atlantic slave trade and provide a framework
within which the seminars are situated. The seminars are opportunities for more
detailed discussion and exploration of related themes. According to university policy,
attendance at seminars and lectures is mandatory and is recorded using Lancaster’s
online system. You should notify me of any absences or self-certify your non-
attendance through the online systems. I strongly recommend attendance at both
seminars and lectures as it will be difficult to achieve the Learning Outcomes described
above if you miss classes.

Course Readings
A resource list of assigned readings is available through the Moodle site. I have marked
works that are most relevant to the theme of the lecture or seminar as “essential”
readings and you must read these items if you want to get a firm grasp on the module’s
key themes and concepts. I have also provided a list of “recommended” and “optional”
works to consult if you are interested in a particular topic. The amount of reading in
this course does not vary from what you might be expected to do in any history course
(between 100-150 pages per week). We will read both secondary texts (written about
the time under study) and primary texts (written at the time under study). In our
seminars, we will only discuss and analyze primary sources , all of which are
essential readings. You must read them before the seminar. I have also provided a list
of optional secondary sources that will help you to contextualize those sources.

Whether you are reading primary or secondary sources, your goal is to read critically.
That means that you should try to think about the logic, the goals and the explanatory
strategies that are integral parts of any text that you encounter. This approach helps us
to think about what historians actually do when they interpret the past and it also asks
you interpret the past for yourselves. You will find some of the texts persuasive and
others less so. This is up to you, but your goal is to explain and support your position
in your written work, and in a way that you can share with the other members of the
seminar. You will find that some members of the group agree with you and that others
disagree, but an exchange of ideas is at the very centre of historical and humanistic
inquiry.

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 Class Schedule
Lecture 1: Monday, 4-5pm, Welcome Centre LT1
Lecture 2: Tuesday, 9-10am, Welcome Centre LT1

Seminar Group 1: Thursday, 3-4pm, Bowland North SR3

Seminar Group 2: Tuesday, 1-2pm, Bowland North SR22
Seminar Group 3: Thursday, 5-6pm, LICA A04
Seminar Group 4: Tuesday, 3-4pm, LICA A06

Office Hours: Monday, 3-4pm, Bowland College, B06

Tuesday, 10-11am, Bowland College, B06

Electronic Devices Policy

Electronic devices such as laptops, phones and tablets are an important part of modern
university life and I appreciate that most of you use them for taking notes and accessing
the readings. They are therefore permitted in the lectures. You must not, however, use
them in a way that will disturb the other students; those behind you in the lecture hall
can see everything you are looking at! Electronic devices are permitted in seminars but
please strive to avoid using them to the detriment of our discussion. You should have
read the assigned materials that we will discuss before class and so accessing them in
the class itself will be of little help. I will make a copy of the assigned readings available
in class for those of you who want to look up specific quotations or passages. If you
have any questions about this policy please speak to me in person or email me.

Office Hours
Office hours are scheduled on Monday, 3-4pm, and Tuesday, 10-11am, and will be held
in my office, Bowland College, B06. This is time that I have set aside to discuss anything
related to the module, be it the content; the assessments; or particular themes that
interest you. You do not need to make an appointment if you would like to see me
during office hours; just drop by. If the times do not suit, I am also happy to answer
emails about anything related to the module. I will strive to provide an answer within
twenty-four hours except on weekends and holidays. If you have any questions or
concerns about the module please do contact me via email or speak to me in person. I
am here to help!

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 Student Responsibilities
I expect you to:

 Read the “essential” readings before lectures and seminars.

 Attend the lectures, pay attention to their content, and desist from behavior that
will disturb other students or the instructor.

 Attend the seminars and participate in class discussions in a collegial manner. If

you are shy or feel overwhelmed, please speak to me and we can find a way that
you can be included. Likewise, if you are courageous and unafraid to speak, try
not to dominate the conversation.

 Treat the contributions of other students with respect and be mindful of the
difficult nature of the module’s themes. The slave trade involved violence,
degradation, and exploitation on an enormous scale, and these issues resonate
today.

 Articulate the central theses of the readings and the evidence and reasoning that
support those claims in both written work and in class discussion in the
discussion.

 Desist from plagiarizing the works of scholars or your peers. The University
operates a clear code that spells out penalties for plagiarism, including exclusion
from the university. You are strongly advised to read the relevant section on
plagiarism in your Student Handbook.

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 Assessment

This module will be assessed by:

Coursework
One 2-2,500 word essay that is due in the last week of the module. The word
count does not include your bibliography or your reference notes, but it gives
you a flexible target range of 500 words. I will provide a separate list of questions
that you can answer in your essay via the Moodle. They will be designed in such
a way that you will need to rely on primary and secondary sources and, in many
cases, data drawn from Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database. I will give
a lecture in week eight that will provide additional guidance and tips on writing
the coursework essay that will also be of use for your other modules.
The essay is worth 40% of your final grade.

Examination
A two-hour closed book examination held in weeks 24-28. You will answer two
unseen questions. The first question will be broadly conceived, enabling you to
demonstrate your knowledge of the module’s key themes that will be covered in
the lectures and secondary sources. The second question will be focused on
specific primary sources, allowing you to demonstrate your understanding of
the questions we discussed in seminars. The previous year’s exam, plus a mock,
will be provided on the Moodle allowing you to familiarize yourself with the
types of questions that you might expect. I will also give a revision lecture in the
summer term that will give you some exam tips.
Each exam question is worth 30% of your grade, and the exam is
consequently worth 60% of your final grade.

If you have any questions or concerns about either the coursework essay or the
examination, please speak to me in person or drop me an email.

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 Recommended Books
You are not required to purchase any books for this module. However, the
following texts provide an overview of the history of the trans-Atlantic slave trade:

James A. Rawley with Stephen D. Behrendt, The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade: A History,
Revised Edition (2009). Paperback £23

Marcus Rediker, The Slave Ship: A Human History (2008). Paperback, £13

Lisa A. Lindsay, Captives as Commodities: The Transatlantic Slave Trade (2007). Paperback,
£24

James Walvin, Black Ivory: Slavery in the British Empire 2nd ed. (2001). Paperback £25

Hugh Thomas, The Slave Trade: History of the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1440-1870 (1997).
Paperback, £17. NOTE: Thomas’ book is a comprehensive history of the slave trade
from its beginning to end, but it is extremely long (925 pages!)

Multiple portions of the following texts appear in the essential or recommended

readings, but you do not need to purchase them:

David Brion Davis, Inhuman Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World (2008).
Paperback. £15

Simon Newman, A New World of Labor: The Development of Plantation Slavery in the British
Atlantic (2013). Paperback. £17.75

David Richardson, Suzanne Schwarz, and Anthony Tibbles eds., Liverpool and
Transatlantic Slavery (2010). Paperback. £15

Stephanie E. Smallwood, Saltwater Slavery: A Middle Passage from Africa to American

Diaspora (2008). Paperback. £18.95

John K. Thornton, Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800 2nd
ed. (1998). Paperback. £29.99

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 Lecture 1: Introduction and Ancient Slavery
Questions for Consideration:
 What defines whether someone is a slave?
 The Romans and Greeks defined themselves as a free people. Can their freedom
be reconciled with their widespread ownership of slaves?
 Given slavery’s ubiquity in human history, should we think of slavery, rather than
freedom, as man’s natural condition?

Readings: Recommended
David Eltis, “A Brief Overview of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade,” Voyages: The Trans-
Atlantic Slave Trade Database (2007): http://slavevoyages.org/assessment/essays#

Peter Hunt, “Enslavement,” Ancient Greek and Roman Slavery (2018), pp.31-48

Sandra R. Joshel, “The Sale of Slaves,” Slavery in the Roman World (2010), pp.77-110

Jerry Toner, “How to Buy a Slave,” The Roman Guide to Slave Management (2016), pp.14-
36

John Bodel, “Slave Labour and Roman Society” in Keith Bradley and Paul Cartledge
eds., The Cambridge World History of Slavery, Vol.1 (2011), pp.311-336

David Brion Davis, “The Ancient Foundations of Modern Slavery,” Inhuman Bondage:
The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World (2006), pp.27-47

Orlando Patterson, Slavery and Social Death (1985) pp.18-27, 38-65

David Brion Davis, “Continuity in the History of Servitude,” The Problem of Slavery in
Western Culture (1969), pp.29-61

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 Lecture 2: The Old World Slave Trade
Questions for Consideration:
 Robin Blackburn claims that “Slavery in the New World was not based on an
Old World prototype” (p.66). Do you agree?
 In what ways might the Old World and trans-Saharan slave trades have laid the
foundations for the trans-Atlantic slave trade?
 What factors led both European and Islamic states to enslave Africans?

Readings: Essential
Robin Blackburn, “The Old World Background to European Colonial Slavery,”
William and Mary Quarterly 54:1 (Jan. 1997): 65-102

Readings: Recommended
William D. Phillips Jr., “The History of Slavery in Iberia,” Slavery in Medieval and Early
Modern Iberia (2014), pp.10-27

Chouki El Hamel, “The Notion of Slavery and the Justification of Concubinage as an

Institution of Slavery in Islam,” Black Morocco: A History of Slavery, Race, and Islam
(2014), pp.17-59

Simon P. Newman, “England,” A New World of Labor: The Development of Plantation

Slavery in the British Atlantic (2013), pp.17-35

Toby Green, “The Formation of Early Atlantic Societies in Senegambia and Upper
Guinea,” The Rise of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade in Western Africa, 1300–1589 (2012),
pp.69-94

Michael Guasco, “The Nature of a Slave: Human Bondage in Early Modern

England,” Slaves and Englishmen: Human Bondage in the Early Modern Atlantic World
(2014), pp.11-40

Paul Lovejoy, “On the Frontiers of Islam, 1400-1600,” Transformations in Slavery (2011),
pp. 25-44

J.D. Fage, “Slavery and the Slave Trade in the Context of West African History,” The
Journal of African History 10:3 (1969): 393-404

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 Lecture 3: Iberian Expansion and the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade’s
Beginnings, 1492-1600
Question for Consideration
 Why did Iberian settlers enslave Native Americans?
 David Wheat describes enslaved Africans in the early Iberian Americas as
“Black Peasants.” Is this an accurate description?
 Could the New World have been colonized without the enslavement of
millions of Native Americans and Africans?

Readings: Essential
Andres Resendez, “Caribbean Debacle,” The Other Slavery: The Untold Story of Indian
Enslavement in America (2016), pp.13-45

Readings: Recommended
David Wheat, “Black Peasants,” Atlantic Africa and the Spanish Caribbean, 1570-1640
(2016), pp.181-215

Alex Borucki, David Eltis, and David Wheat, “Atlantic History and the Slave Trade to
Spanish America,” The American Historical Review 120:2 (Apr. 2015): 433-461

Christopher Schmidt-Nowara, “Slavery and Iberian Colonization,” in Schmidt-

Nowara ed. Slavery, Freedom, and Abolition in Latin America and the Atlantic World (2011),
pp.9-47

James A. Rawley and Stephen D. Behrendt, “Spain and the Slave Trade,” The
Transatlantic Slave Trade: A History (2005)

David Brion Davis, “How Africans Became Integral to New World History,” Inhuman
Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World (2006), pp.77-102

Stuart Schwarz, “‘A Commonwealth within Itself:’ The Early Brazilian Sugar Industry,
1550-1670” in Stuart Schwartz ed. Tropical Babylons: Sugar and the Making of the Atlantic
World, 1450-1680 (2004), pp.158-200

John K. Thornton, “The birth of an Atlantic world,” Africa and Africans in the Making of
the Atlantic World 2nd ed. (1998), pp.13-42

12
 Lecture 4: British Caribbean Sugar and the Growth of the Slave
Trade, 1600-1700
Questions for Consideration
 Why did sugar, above other tropical crops, become synonymous with African
slavery?
 Why might Barbados be described as a “laboratory” regarding sugar and
slavery?
 How important was European demand for sugar in driving the seventeenth
century expansion in the slave trade?

Readings: Essential
Trevor Burnard, “The Rise of the Large Integrated Plantation,” Planters, Merchants, and
Slaves: Plantation Societies in British America (2015), pp.22-52

Readings: Recommended
James Walvin, “A Traditional Taste,” Sugar: The World Corrupted from Slavery to Obesity
(2018), pp.1-18

Simon P. Newman, “3: Barbados,” “4: White Slaves,” “8: The Harsh Tyranny of our
Masters,” “9: Forced to Labour Beyond Their Natural Strength,” A New World of
Labor: The Development of Plantation Slavery in the British Atlantic (2013), pp.54-107, 189-
242

Matthew Parker, “The Sugar Revolution’” The Sugar Barons: Family Corruption, Empire
and War (2011), pp.32-51

Russell Menard, “The Growth of the Barbadian Sugar Industry over the Seventeenth
Century,” Sweet Negotiations: Sugar, Slavery, and Plantation Agriculture in Early Barbados
(2006), pp.67-90

David Brion Davis, “The Atlantic Slave System: Brazil and the Caribbean,” “Slavery
in Colonial North America,” Inhuman Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New
World (2006), pp.103-123

Richard S. Dunn, “Sugar,” Sugar and Slaves: The Rise of the Planter Class in the English West
Indies, 1624-1713 (2000), pp.224-262

Richard B. Sheridan, “‘Sugar, the Inseparable Companion of Tea,’” Sugar and Slavery:
An Economic History of the British West Indies, 1623-1775 (2000), pp.18-35

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 Lecture 5: Race, Gender, and African Slavery
Questions for Consideration
 In what way did gender influence African slavery?
 What factors influenced the development of a racialized form of slavery in the
Atlantic World?
 Does the racialized nature of African slavery make it different from other forms of
slavery in world history?

Readings: Essential
Jennifer L. Morgan, ‘Some Could Suckle over Their Shoulder:’ Male Travelers, Female
Bodies, and the Gendering of Racial Ideology, 1500-1770,” WMQ, 54:1 (1997): 167-92

Readings: Recommended
Katherine Gerbner, “From Christian to White,” Christian Slavery: Conversion and Race in the
Protestant Atlantic World (2018), pp.74-90

Edward B. Rugemer, “The Development of Mastery and Race in the Comprehensive

Slave Codes of the Greater Caribbean during the Seventeenth Century” WMQ, 70:3 (July
2013): 429-458

Catherine Molineux, “Black Servitude and the Refinement of Britain,” Faces of perfect ebony:
encountering Atlantic slavery in imperial Britain (2012), pp.18-60

David Brion Davis, “The Origins of Antiblack Racism in the New World,” Inhuman
Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World (2006), pp.48-76

Jennifer L. Morgan, “‘Women’s Sweat’: Gender and Agricultural Labor in the Atlantic
World,” Laboring Women: Reproduction and Gender in New World Slavery (2004), pp.144-165

David M. Goldenberg, “The Color of Women,” The Curse of Ham: Race and Slavery in Early
Judaism, Christianity, and Islam (2003), pp.79-92

David Eltis, “Gender and Slavery in the Early Modern Atlantic World,” The Rise of African
Slavery in the Americas (2000), pp.85-113

Bernard Lewis, “In Black and White,” Race and Slavery in the Middle East: An historical
Enquiry (1992), pp.54-61

Winthrop Jordan, “First Impressions: Initial English Confrontation with Africans,” White
Over Black: American Attitudes toward the Negro, 1550-1812 (1968), pp.3-44

14
Lecture 6: The Organization of the Slave Trade in Europe, 1600-1807
Questions for Consideration
 How important was the support of European states for the growth of the
trans-Atlantic slave trade during the seventeenth century?
 Did European merchants consider the slave trade to be a business like any
other?
 Was the slave trade a particularly profitable business?

Readings: Essential
Stephen D. Behrendt, “Markets, Transaction Cycles, and Profits: Merchant Decision
Making in the British Slave Trade,” WMQ, 58:1 (2001): 171–204

Readings: Recommended
William Pettigrew, Freedom’s Debt: The Royal African Company and the Politics of the Atlantic
Slave Trade, 1672-1752 (2016)

Randy J. Sparks, “Annamaboe Joins the Atlantic World,” Where the Negroes are Masters:
An African Port in the Era of the Slave Trade (2014), pp.7-34

Simon P. Newman, “2: The Gold Coast,” “4: White Slaves,” “5: A Company of White
Negroes,” A New World of Labor (2013), pp.36-53, 71-136

Kenneth Morgan, “James Rogers and the Bristol slave trade,” Historical Research, 76
(March 2003): 189-216

David Hancock, “Slaving: Bance Island’s ‘General Rendezvouz,’” Citizens of the World:
London Merchants and the Integration of the British Atlantic Community, 1735-1785 (1997),
pp.172-220

Herbert S. Klein, “The European Organization of the Slave Trade,” The Atlantic Slave
Trade (1999), pp.74-102

J.E. Inikori, “Market Structure and the Profits of the British African Trade in the Late
Eighteenth Century,” Journal of Economic History, 41 (Dec. 1981): 745-76

Robert Louis Stein, “III: The Traders and Their Business,” The French Slave Trade in the
Eighteenth Century: An Old Regime Business (1979), pp.129-195

K.G. Davies, “The Company in Africa,” The Royal African Company (1957), pp.213-290

15
 Lecture 7: The African Slave Trade, 1600-1807
Questions for Consideration
 In what ways did the trans-Atlantic slave trade influence the African slave trade
and visa-versa?
 Why did Africans enslave other Africans?
 Were there any similarities between systems of slavery in Africa and the
Americas?

Readings: Essential
John K. Thornton, “Slavery and African social structure” Africa and Africans in the
Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800 2nd ed. (1998), pp.72-97

Readings: Recommended
Randy J. Sparks, “The Process of Enslavement at Annamboe,” Where the Negroes are
Masters: An African Port in the Era of the Slave Trade (2014), pp.122-162

Ugo Nwokeji, “The Slave Trade, Gender, and Culture,” The Slave Trade and Culture in
the Bight of Biafra: An African Society in the Atlantic World (2010), pp.144-177

Linda M. Heywood and John K. Thornton, “Wars, Civil Unrest, and the Dynamics of
Enslavement in West Central Africa, 1607-1660,” Central Africans, Atlantic Creoles, and
the Foundation of the Americas, 1585-1660 (2007), pp.109-168

Walter Hawthorne, “Producing Slaves in a Decentralized Region,” Planting Rice and

Harvesting Slaves: Transformations along the Guinea-Bissau Coast, 1400-1900 (2003), pp.91-
116

Thierno Mouctar Bah, “Slave-Raiding and Defensive Systems South of Lake Chad
from the Sixteenth to the Nineteenth Century” in Sylviane A. Diouf ed., Fighting the
Slave Trade: West African Strategies (2003), pp.15-30

Joseph Miller, “The Production of People: Political Consolidation and the Release of
Dependents for Export,” Way of Death: Merchant Capitalism and the Angolan Slave Trade,
1730-1820 (1988), pp.105-139

David Richardson, “West African Consumption Patterns and their Influence on the
Eighteenth-Century English Slave Trade,” in Henry A. Gemery and Jan S. Hogendorn
eds., The Uncommon Market: Essays in the Economic History of the Atlantic Slave Trade
(1979), pp. 303–330

16
 Seminar 1: The Sale of Slaves on the African Coast
Questions for Consideration
 Did Europeans or Africans have the upper hand when trading for slaves?
 Why did both European captains and African brokers treat enslaved people in
such a dehumanizing manner?
 Were Africans willing partners in the slave trade?

Readings: Essential
Extract of letters from King Afonso I of Kongo to Dom João III, 1526

Alexander Falconbridge, An Account of the Slave Trade on the Coast of Africa (1788), pp.2-
11

Olaudah Equiano, Interesting Narrative (1788), pp.30-46

Selection from Stephen D. Behrendt, A.J.H. Latham, and David Northrup eds., The
Diary of Antera Duke, an Eighteenth-Century African Slave Trader (2010)

Readings: Recommended
Stephen D. Behrendt, A.J.H. Latham, and David Northrup eds., “The Slave Trade at
Old Calabar,” The Diary of Antera Duke, an Eighteenth-Century African Slave Trader (2010),
pp.46-80

Alexander X. Byrd, “The Slave Trade from the Biafran Interior,” Captives and Voyagers:
Black Migrants Across the Eighteenth-Century British Atlantic World (2008), pp.17-31

Stephanie Smallwood, “Turning African Captives into Atlantic Commodities,”

Saltwater Slavery: A Middle Passage from Africa to American Diaspora (2007), pp.33-64

Paul E. Lovejoy and David Richardson, “‘This Horrid Hole:’ Royal Authority,
Commerce and Credit at Bonny, 1690-1840,” The Journal of African History, 45:3 (2004):
363-392

Paul E. Lovejoy and David Richardson, “The Business of Slaving: Pawnship in

Western Africa, c. 1600-1810,” The Journal of African History, 42:1 (2001): 67-89

Stanley B. Alpern, “What Africans Got for Their Slaves: A Master List of European
Trade Goods,” History in Africa, 22 (1995): 5-43

17
 Lecture 8: The Slave Trade’s Impacts on Africa
Questions for Consideration
 Did the slave trade hinder or benefit the long-term economic development of
African societies?
 How did the slave trade affect the demography of Atlantic Africa?
 Should European, American and African nations who engaged in the slave
trade pay reparations to the descendants of slaves?

Readings: Essential
Randy J. Sparks, “Nothing but Sivellity and Fare Trade: Old Calabar and the Impact
of the Slave Trade on an African Society,” The Two Princes of Old Calabar: An Atlantic
Odyssey (2004), pp.33-69

Readings: Recommended
Ugo Nwokeji, “The Atlantic Slave Trade and Population Density: A Historical
Demography of the Biafran Hinterland,” Canadian Journal of African Studies, 34:3
(2000): 616-655

John K. Thornton, “Horses, Boats and Infantry: The Gap of Benin,” Warfare in
Atlantic Africa, 1500-1800 (1999), pp.75-98

John K. Thornton, “The development of commerce between Europeans and

Africans,” Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800 2nd ed.
(1998), pp.43-71

Robin Law, “The Atlantic Slave Trade, II: The Operation and Impact of the Trade,”
The Slave Coast of West Africa, 1550-1750: The Impact of the Atlantic Slave Trade on an
African Society (1991), pp.156-224

David Eltis and Lawrence C. Jennings, “Trade between Western Africa and the
Atlantic World in the Pre-Colonial Era,” AHR, 93:4 (Oct. 1988): 936-959

David Northrup, “The Slave Trade and Economic Development,” Trade Without
Rulers: Pre-Colonial Eocnomic Development in South-Eastern Nigeria (1978), pp.146-176

Walter Rodney, “The European Slave Trade as a Basic Factor in African

Underdevelopment,” How Europe Underdeveloped Africa (1974)

18
 Lecture 9: The Middle Passage, 1600-1807
Questions for Consideration
 If Europeans wanted to sell slaves at a profit in the Americas, why did they
transport them in such terrible conditions?
 Was the Middle Passage the defining portion of an African’s enslavement?
 What are the benefits and draw-backs of a quantitative approach to the study
of the slave trade?

Readings: Essential
Stephanie Smallwood, “The Living Dead aboard the Slave Ship at Sea,” Saltwater
Slavery: A Middle Passage from Africa to American Diaspora (2007), pp.122-152

Readings: Recommended
Sowande M. Mustakeem, “Battered Bodies, Enfeebled Minds,” Slavery at Sea: Terror,
Sex, and Sickness in the Middle Passage (2016)

Joanne Chassot, “Voyage through death/ to life upon these shores:” the living dead
of the Middle Passage, Atlantic Studies, 12:1 (2015): 90-108

Audra Diptee, “The Atlantic Crossing,” From Africa to Jamaica: The Making of an Atlantic
Slave Society, 1775–1807 (2010), pp.73-88

Stephen D. Behrendt, “Ecology, Seasonality, and the Transatlantic Slave Trade” in

Bernard Bailyn and Patricia L. Denault eds., Soundings in Atlantic History (2009), pp.44-
85

Marcus Rediker, “The Evolution of the Slave Ship,” The Slave Ship: A Human History
(2007), pp.41-72

Emma Christopher, “Sea Changes,” Slave Ship Sailors and their Captive Cargoes, 1730-
1807 (2006), pp.163-194

Herbert S. Klein et al., “Transoceanic Mortality: The Slave Trade in Comparative

Perspective,” WMQ, 58:1 (Jan. 2001): 93-118

John K. Thornton, “The process of enslavement and the slave trade,” Africa and
Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800 2nd ed. (1998), pp.98-127

19
 Seminar 2: Slave Resistance and Rebellion on the Middle Passage
Questions for Consideration
 How did Africans’ resistance to their enslavement shape both the way in which
they were transported, and the wider contours of the slave trade?
 Why did some Africans not rebel aboard slave ships?
 Marcus Rediker describes slave ships as “floating prisons.” In what ways is this
accurate?

Readings: Essential
Olaudah Equiano, Interesting Narrative (London, 1788), pp.46-61

Account of the insurrection on the slave ship Hudibras

Captain William Snelgrave on the suppression of ship revolts

Readings: Recommended
Andrew Marcum and David Skarbek, “Why didn’t slaves revolt more often during the
Middle Passage,” Rationality and Society, 26:2 (2014): 236-262

Eric Robert Taylor, “Conditions Favourable for Revolt,” “Precautions against

Revolt,” If We Must Die: Shipboard Insurrections in the Era of the Atlantic Slave Trade (2009),
pp.67-103

Stephanie E. Smallwood, “African Guardians, European Slave Ships, and the

Changing Dynamics of Power in the Early Modern Atlantic,” WMQ, 64:4 (Oct.,
2007): 679-716

David Richardson, “Shipboard Revolts, African Authority, and the Atlantic Slave
Trade,” WMQ, Vol. 58, No. 1 (Jan., 2001): 69-92

Stephen D. Behrendt, David Eltis, and David Richardson, “The Costs of Coercion:
African Agency in the Pre-Modern Atlantic World,” The Economic History Review, 54:3
(Aug., 2001): 454-476

20
 Lecture 10: The Sale of Slaves in the Americas and the Intra-
American Slave Trade, 1600-1807
Questions for Consideration
 For the slaves, did the Middle Passage end when a ship dropped anchor in an
American port?
 How did the inter-colonial slave trade alter the contours of American slavery?
 What affect did slave sales have upon the forced migration of enslaved people
in the Americas?

Readings: Essential
Gregory E. O’Malley, “Final Passages: Captives in the Intercolonial Slave Trade,”
Final Passages: The Intercolonial Slave Trade of British America, 1619-1807 (2016), pp.30-84

Readings: Recommended
Nicholas Radburn, “Guinea Factors, Slave Sales, and the Profits of the Transatlantic
Slave Trade in Late Eighteenth-Century Jamaica: The Case of John Tailyour,” WMQ,
72:2 (April, 2015): 243-286

Nicholas Radburn, “Keeping ‘the wheel in motion:’ Trans-Atlantic Credit Terms,

Slave Prices, and the Geography of Slavery in the British Americas, 1755–1807,”
Journal of Economic History, 75:3 (Sept. 2015): 660-689

Sean Kelley, “Scrambling for Slaves: Captive Sales in Colonial South Carolina,” Slavery
& Abolition, 34:1 (2013): 1-21

Stephanie Smallwood, “Turning Atlantic Commodities into American Slaves,”

Saltwater Slavery: A Middle Passage from Africa to American Diaspora (2008), pp.153-181

Trevor Burnard, “Who bought slaves in early America? Purchasers of slaves from the
Royal African company in Jamaica, 1674–1708,” Slavery & Abolition, 17:2 (1996): 68-
92

David W. Galenson, “On the order of purchases by characteristics at slave sales,”

Traders, Planters and Slaves: Market Behavior in Early English America (1986), pp.71-92

21
 Lecture 11: Plantation Labor in the Americas, 1600-1807
Questions for Consideration
 Did labor define the lives of enslaved people in the Americas?
 How did the labor requirements of particular plantation crops affect the lives
of the slaves who were forced to grow them?
 Would it be preferable to be a slave in Virginia or Jamaica?

Readings: Essential
Richard S. Dunn, “A Tale of Two Plantations: Slave Life at Mesopotamia in Jamaica
and Mount Airy in Virginia, 1799 to 1828,” WMQ, 34:1 (Jan., 1977): 32-65

Readings: Recommended
Marissa J. Fuentes, “Agatha: White Women Slaveowners and the Dialectic of
Racialized Gender,” Dispossessed Lives: Enslaved Women, Violence, and the Archive (2018)

Randy M. Browne, “The Moral Economy of Survival,” Surviving Slavery in the British
Caribbean (2017), pp.157-189

Trevor Burnard and John Garrigus, “The Plantation World,” The Plantation Machine:
Atlantic Capitalism in French Saint-Domingue and British Jamaica (2016), pp.25-49

Stephanie Smallwood, “Life and Death in Diaspora,” Saltwater Slavery: A Middle Passage
from Africa to American Diaspora (2008), pp.182-208

Vincent Brown, “Worlds of Wealth and Death,” The Reaper’s Garden: Death and Power in
the World of Atlantic Slavery (2008), pp.13-59

Alexander X. Byrd, “White Power and the Context of Slave Seasoning in Eighteenth-
Century Jamaica,” Captives and Voyagers: Black Migrants Across the Eighteenth-Century
British Atlantic World (2008), pp.57-85

Philip D. Morgan, “Slaves and Livestock in Eighteenth-Century Jamaica: Vineyard

Pen, 1750-1751,” WMQ, 52:1 (Jan., 1995): 47-76

Michael Craton, “Conformists: Ten Ordinary Slaves,” Searching for the Invisible Man:
Slaves and Plantation Life in Jamaica (1978)

Michael Craton & James Walvin, “Slave Society on an Eighteenth-Century Estate,” A

Jamaican Plantation: The History of Worthy Park 1670-1970 (1970)

22
 Seminar 3: Slave Life in the Americas, 1600-1807
Questions for Consideration
 In late-eighteenth century Jamaica, there were ten enslaved people for every
white. Why were whites like Thistlewood so complacent about the risk of slave
rebellion?
 Was violence the linchpin of relations between white and blacks in the
Americas?
 How effective were colonial laws in limiting the power of slave masters?

Readings: Essential
Selections from the diaries of Thomas Thistlewood, Jamaican plantation overseer

Jamaica’s Consolidated Slave Code, 1788

Readings: Recommended
Matthew Parker, “Thomas Thistlewood in Jamaica: ‘Tonight very lonely and
melancholy again,’” The Sugar Barons (2011), pp.270-284

James Walvin, “A Jamaica Apprenticeship; Sugar and Slaves,” The Trader, The Owner,
The Slave: Parallel Lives in the Age of Slavery (2008), pp.105-138

James Robertson, “‘The best poor man's country’? Thomas Thistlewood in

eighteenth-century Jamaica,” Caribbean Quarterly, 52:4 (2006): 74-84

Trevor Burnard, “Weapons of the Strong and Responses of the Weak: Thistlewood’s
War with His Slaves,” Mastery, Tyranny, and Desire: Thomas Thistlewood and His Slaves in
the Anglo Jamaican World (2004), pp.137-174

Walter Johnson, “On Agency,” Journal of Social History, 37:1 (Fall 2003): 113-124

23
 Lecture 12: Slave Culture in the Americas, 1600-1807
Questions for Consideration
 Did enslaved people successfully transplant their specific African cultures to
the Americas?
 How did African culture shape work regimes on American plantations?
 What impact has slave culture had on the modern Americas?

Readings: Essential
James Sidbury and Jorge Canizares-Esguerra, “Mapping Ethnogenesis in the Early
Modern Atlantic,” WMQ, 68:2 (Apr., 2011): 181-208

Readings: Recommended
James H. Sweet, “The Politics of Healing,” Domingos Álvares, African Healing, and the
Intellectual History of the Atlantic World (2011), pp.123-146

David Eltis, Philip Morgan and David Richardson, “Agency and Diaspora in Atlantic
History: Reassessing the African Contribution to Rice Cultivation in the Americas,”
The American Historical Review, 112:5 (Dec., 2007): 1329-1358

Paul Lovejoy, “Ethnic Designations of the Slave Trade and the Reconstruction of the
History of Trans-Atlantic Slavery” in Paul Lovejoy and David Trotman eds., Trans-
Atlantic Dimensions of Ethnicity in the African Diaspora (2003), pp.9-42

Judith Ann Carney, “Out of Africa: Rice Culture and African Continuities,” Black Rice:
The African Origins of Rice Cultivation in the Americas (2002), pp.69-106

Trevor Burnard, “E pluribus plures: ethnicities in early Jamaica,” Jamaica Historical

Review, 56 (2001): 8-22

Philip D. Morgan, “The cultural implications of the Atlantic slave trade: African
regional origins, American destinations and new world developments,” Slavery and
Abolition, 18:1 (1997): 122-145

John K. Thornton, “African cultural groups in the Atlantic world,” Africa and Africans
in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800 2nd ed. (1998), 183-205

Sidney W. Mintz and Richard Price, The Birth of African-American Culture: An

Anthropological Perspective (1976)

24
 Lecture 13: North-west England and the Slave Trade, 1600-1807
Questions for Consideration
 Why did Liverpool become the leading slaving port in the eighteenth-century
Atlantic World?
 How important was the slave trade for the economic development of the
north-west?
 In 1999, Liverpool’s common council formally apologized for the town’s
involvement in the slave trade. Should Liverpool go further and pay reparations
to the descendants of enslaved people?

Readings: Essential
Jane Longmore, “‘Cemented by the Blood of a Negro’? The Impact of the
Slave Trade on Eighteenth-Century Liverpool,” in David Richardson, Suzanne
Schwarz and Anthony Tibbles eds., Liverpool and Transatlantic Slavery (2007), pp.227-
251

Readings: Recommended
Jane Longmore, “Portrait of a Slave-Trading Family: The Staniforths of Liverpool,” in
Katie Donington, Ryan Handley and Jessica Moody eds. Britain's History and Memory of
Transatlantic Slavery (2017), pp.60-82

Peter Earle, “Slave Ship Captain,” “Slave Merchant,” The Earles of Liverpool: A Georgian
Merchant Dynasty (2015)

Jane Longmore, “Rural retreats: Liverpool slave traders and their country houses” in
Madge Dresser and Andrew Hann eds. Slavery and the British Country House (2013),
pp.43-53

Sheryllynne Haggerty, “Risk and risk management in the Liverpool slave trade,”
Business & History, 51:6 (2009): 817-834

Kenneth Morgan, “Liverpool’s Dominance in the British Slave Trade, 1740-1807,” in

David Richardson, Suzanne Schwarz and Anthony Tibbles eds., Liverpool and
Transatlantic Slavery (2007), pp.14-42

Stephen D. Behrendt, “Human Capital in the British Slave Trade,” in Ibid., pp.66-97

Paul G.E. Clemens, “The Rise of Liverpool, 1665-1750,” The Economic History Review,
29:2 (May 1976): 211-225

25
 Seminar 4: The Slave Trade’s Impacts on Lancaster
Questions for Consideration
 Elder describes the slave trade as a “marginal trade for marginal men.” Do you
agree with that statement?
 Has the slave trade left any lasting imprints on modern Lancaster?
 Should Lancaster recognize or erase physical evidence of its connection to
slavery and the slave trade?

Field Trip
Visit to George’s Quay, Lancaster Maritime Museum, and slave trade memorial

Readings: Recommended
Alan Rice, “Discovering Traces of Slavery in a City Fraught with Amnesia: Creating
Memorials and Building New Identities in Lancaster,” Creating Memorials, Building
Identities: The Politics of Memory in the Black Atlantic (2010), pp.32-54

Melinda Elder, “The Liverpool Slave Trade, Lancaster and its Environs,” in David
Richardson, Suzanne Schwarz and Anthony Tibbles eds., Liverpool and Transatlantic
Slavery (2007), pp.118-137

Marcie Holmes, “Lancaster Quakers and the Transatlantic Slave Trade,” Documenting
Dissent http://www.documentingdissent.org.uk/lancaster-quakers-and-the-
transatlantic-slave-trade/

Marcie Holmes, “Lancaster Quakers and the Campaign to Abolish Slavery,

Documenting Dissent http://www.documentingdissent.org.uk/lancaster-quakers-and-
the-campaign-to-abolish-slavery/

Melinda Elder, The Slave Trade and the Economic Development of 18th- Century Lancaster
(1992)

David Richardson and M.M. Schofield, “Whitehaven and the eighteenth-century

British Slave Trade,” Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and
Archaeological Society, 92 (1992): 183-204

M.M. Schofield, “The Slave Trade from Lancashire and Cheshire Ports Outside
Liverpool, c.1750-c.1790,” in Roger Anstey and P.E.H. Hair eds., Liverpool, the African
Slave Trade, and Abolition (1989), pp.30-72

26
 Lecture 14: The Slave Trade’s Impacts on Britain
Questions for Consideration
 What does the example of the plantation hoe tell us about the impact of
Atlantic slavery on British industrial development?
 Beyond industrialization, what other effects might Atlantic slavery have had on
British economic development?
 Is the slave trade largely to blame for uneven patterns of economic
development in the Atlantic basin today?

Readings: Essential
Chris Evans, “The Plantation Hoe: The Rise and Fall of an Atlantic Commodity,
1650–1850,” WMQ, 69:1 (Jan., 2012): 71-100

Readings: Recommended
Sven Beckert, “The Wages of War Capitalism,” Empire of Cotton: A Global History
(2014), pp.56-82

Catherine Hall et al, “Helping to make Britain great: the commercial legacies of slave-
ownership in Britain,” Legacies of British Slave-Ownership: Colonial Slavery and the Formation
of Victorian Britain (2014), pp.78-126

Nuala Zahedieh, “Colonies, copper, and the market for inventive activity in England
and Wales, 1680-1730,” Economic History Review, 66:3 (Aug., 2013): 805-825

Kenneth Morgan, “Slavery, Atlantic trade and capital accumulation,” Slavery Atlantic
Trade and the British Economy (2001), pp.49-60

David Eltis and Stanley Engerman, “The Importance of Slavery and the Slave Trade
to Industrializing Britain,” Journal of Economic History, 60:1 (2000): 123-144

Robin Blackburn, “New World Slavery, Primitive Accumulation and British

Industrialization,” The Making of New World Slavery: From the Baroque to the Modern, 1492-
1800 (1997), pp.509-580

Sidney W. Mintz, “Power,” Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History
(1986), pp.151-186

Eric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery (1944), pp.126-177

27
 Lecture 15: The Abolition of the Slave Trade in Britain, 1783-1807
Questions for Consideration
 Why did abolitionism take root in Britain and America before other countries?
 Was the abolition of the slave trade driven by morality, economics, or a
combination of the two?
 Do you think modern Britons need not apologize for the slave trade, given that
they led the world in its abolition?

Readings: Essential
Christopher L. Brown, “Empire Without Slaves: British Concepts of Emancipation in
the Age of the American Revolution,” WMQ, 56:2 (Apr., 1999): 273-306

Readings: Recommended
Manisha Sinha, “Prophets Without Honor,” The Slave’s Cause: A History of Abolition
(2016), pp.9-33

Michael Jordan, “The Abolitionists,” The Great Abolition Sham: The True Story of the End
of the British Slave Trade (2010), pp.85-101

James Walvin, “The Slave Trade, Abolition and Public Memory,” Transactions of the
Royal Historical Society, 6th ser., 19 (2009): 139-149

David Beck Ryden, “The Business Paradox of Rising Productivity and Collapsing
Profitability,” West Indian Slavery and British Abolition, 1783-1807 (2009), pp.216-253

Christopher L. Brown, “Africa, Africans, and the Idea of Abolition,” Moral Capital:
Foundation of British Abolitionism (2006), pp.259-332

David Brion Davis, “The Problem of Slavery in the American Revolution,” Inhuman
Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World (2006), pp.141-156

Seymour Drescher, “The Market Mechanism and Abolition,” Econocide: British Slavery
in the Era of Abolition (1977), pp.125-141

Eric Williams, “The American Revolution,” Capitalism and Slavery (1944), pp.108-125

28
 Seminar 5: The Abolition Debates in Britain
Questions for Consideration
 If British abolitionists were “on the right side of history,” why did it take
twenty years for them to achieve their aims?
 Could Britain’s slave traders have put forward a more successful defense of
their business?
 What role did Africans play in the abolition of Britain’s slave trade?

Readings: Essential
Robert Norris, A Short Account of the African Slave Trade… (1788)

Robert Norris’ Logbook from the voyage of the Unity (1769)

Anonymous, An Essay on the African Slave Trade (1790)

Anna Maria Falconbridge, Two Voyages to Sierra Leone during the Years 1791-2-3…
(1794), pp.232-236

Readings: Recommended
John Oldfield, “Building an anti-slavery wall: Strategies,” Transatlantic Abolitionism in the
Age of Revolution: An International History of Anti-slavery (2013), pp.68-100

Seymour Drescher, “Abolitionism without Revolution: Great Britain, 1770s-1820s,”

Abolition: A History of Slavery and Antislavery (2009), pp.205-244

David Brion Davis, “Explanations of British Abolitionism,” Inhuman Bondage: The Rise
and Fall of Slavery in the New World (2006), pp.231-249

Adam Hochschild, “High Noon in Parliament,” Bury the Chains: The British Struggle to
Abolish Slavery (2005), pp.226-240

Robin Law, “The Slave-Trader as Historian: Robert Norris and the History of
Dahomey,” History in Africa, 16 (1989): 219-235

29
Lecture 16: The Haitian Revolution and French Abolition, 1791-1804
Questions for Consideration
 Did the Haitian Revolution hasten or slow the abolition of slavery in the
Atlantic World?
 In what ways did the abolition of the slave trade differ in the French, British,
and Spanish Empires?
 Haiti is now one of the poorest nations in the world. Would it have fared
differently if it had not won its independence through a slave rebellion?

Readings: Essential
Robin Blackburn, “Spanish America: Independence and Emancipation,” The Overthrow
of Colonial Slavery, 1776-1848 (1988), pp.331-380

Readings: Recommended
Paul Cheney, “Humanity and Interest,” Cul de Sac: Patrimony, Capitalism, and Slavery in
French Saint-Domingue (2018), pp.71-104

Jeremy D. Popkin, “The Road to General Emancipation,” You Are All Free: The
Haitian Revolution and the Abolition of Slavery (2010), pp.246-288

David Brion Davis, “The Impact of the French and Haitian Revolution,” Inhuman
Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World (2006), pp.157-174

Laurent Dubois, “Specters of Saint Domingue,” Avengers of the New World: The Story of
the Haitian Revolution (2005), pp.8-35

David Geggus, “The French Slave Trade: An Overview,” WMQ, 58:1 (Jan., 2001):
119-138

Franklin W. Knight, “The Haitian Revolution,” The American Historical Review, 105:1
(Feb., 2000): 103-115

John K. Thornton, “‘I Am the Subject of the King of Congo:’ African Political
Ideology and the Haitian Revolution,” Journal of World History, 4:2 (Fall, 1993): 181-214

Caroline E. Fick, “Slave Resistance,” The Making of Haiti: The Saint Domingue Revolution
from Below (1990), pp.91-117

30
 Lecture 17: Coursework Essay Writing
Questions for Consideration
 How would you honestly describe the process of writing?
 What makes a piece of writing compelling or interesting to read?
 How important is an essay’s structure in convincing the reader of its claims?

Readings: Essential
Helen Sword, The Writer’s Diet (2007)

Readings: Recommended
I.W. Mabbett, “Writing and Organizing your Essay,” “Citing the Sources,” Writing
History Essays (2016), pp.105-130

Steven Pinker, “Why Academics Stink at Writing,” The Chronicle of Higher Education,
(September 26, 2014):
https://stevenpinker.com/files/pinker/files/why_academics_stink_at_writing.pdf

Steven Pinker, “Good Writing,” The Sense of Style: The Thinking Person’s Guide to Writing
in the 21st Century (2014)

Helen Sword, Stylish Academic Writing (2012)

Marcus Rediker, “The Poetics of History from Below,” Perspectives on History (Sept. 1,
2010): https://www.historians.org/publications-and-directories/perspectives-on-
history/september-2010/the-poetics-of-history-from-below

Keith Thomas, “Diary,” London Review of Books, 32:11 (June, 2010): 36-37

Gordon Wood, “In Defense of Academic History Writing,” Perspectives on History

(April 1, 2010): https://www.historians.org/publications-and-
directories/perspectives-on-history/april-2010/in-defense-of-academic-history-
writing

Lynn Hunt, “How Writing Leads to Thinking,” Perspectives on History (Feb. 1, 2010):
https://www.historians.org/publications-and-directories/perspectives-on-
history/february-2010/how-writing-leads-to-thinking

Bryan Greetham, “Introductions,” “Paragraphs- Topic Sentences,” “Paragraphs-

Development and Evidence,” “Conclusions,” How to Write Better Essays (2008),
pp.191-216
31
 Lecture 18: Second Slavery and the Illegal Slave Trade, 1808-1849
Questions for Consideration
 Why did the slave trade increase in volume after Britain’s abolition of the slave
trade in 1807?
 Were slavery and the slave trade compatible with the modern, industrializing
world of the nineteenth century?
 Why did Britain decide to make the eradication of the slave trade such a central
plank of their foreign policy in the nineteenth century?

Readings: Essential
Ada Ferrer, “‘A Colony Worth a Kingdom:’ Cuba’s Sugar Revolution in the Shadow
of Saint-Domingue,” Freedom’s Mirror: Cuba and Haiti in the Age of Revolution (2015),
pp.17-43

Readings: Recommended
Randy J. Sparks, “Blind Justice: The US's Failure to Curb the Illegal Slave Trade,” Law
and History Review, 35, 1 (Feb. 2017): 53-79

Leonardo Marques, “The Consolidation of the Contraband Slave Trade, 1820-1850,”

The United States and the Transatlantic Slave Trade to the Americas, 1776-1867 (2016),
pp.106-138

Robin Blackburn, “The Spiral Path: Ambiguous Victories, Contested Legacies,” The
American Crucible: Slavery, Emancipation and Human Rights (2013), pp.455-490

David Head, “Slave Smuggling by Foreign Privateers: The Illegal Slave Trade and the
Geopolitics of the Early Republic,” Journal of the Early Republic, 33, 3 (2013): 433-462

Herbert S. Klein and Francisco Vidal Luna, “Slavery and the Economy in the
Nineteenth Century,” Slavery in Brazil (2010), pp.74-114

Marika Sherwood, “Cuba and Brazil,” After Abolition: Britain and the Slave Trade Since
1807 (2007), pp.83-110

Dale W. Tomich, “The ‘Second Slavery:’ Bonded Labor and the Transformation of
the Nineteenth-Century World Economy,” Through the Prism of Slavery: Labor, Capital,
and World Economy (2004), pp.56-74

32
 Lecture 19: The Ending of the Slave Trade, 1849-1867
Questions for Consideration
 How did the experience of enslavement change in the illegal era?
 What led to the ending of the slave trade in 1867?
 How did slave traders alter their businesses in the illegal era?

Readings: Essential
Leonardo Marques, “Slave Trading in a New World: The Strategies of North
American Slave Traders in the Age of Abolition,” Journal of the Early Republic, 32:2
(Summer, 2012): 233-260

Readings: Recommended
Sharla Fett, “Surviving Recaptive Transport,” Recaptured Africans: Surviving Slave Ships,
Detention, and Dislocation in the Final Years of the Slave Trade (2017), pp.126-155

Mary Wills, “At War with the ‘Detestable Traffic:’ The Royal Navy’s Anti-Slavery
Cause in the Atlantic Ocean” in John McAleer and Christer Petley eds. The Royal Navy
and the British Atlantic World, c.1750-1820 (2016), pp.123-146

John Harris, “Circuits of Wealth, Circuits of Sorrow: Financing the Illegal

Transatlantic Slave Trade During the Age of Suppression, 1850-66,” Journal of Global
History 11:3 (Nov. 2016): 409-429

Ted Maris-Wolf, “‘Of Blood and Treasure’: Recaptive Africans the Politics of Slave
Trade Suppression,” Journal of the Civil War Era, 4 (2014): 53-83

Jenny S. Martinez, “The Courts of Mixed Commission for the Abolition of the Slave
Trade,” The Slave Trade and the Origins of International Human Rights Law (2012), pp.67-98

David Eltis, “The Impact of Suppression on the Middle Passage,” Economic growth and
the ending of the trans-Atlantic slave trade (1987), pp.125-144

David Murray, “The abolition of the Cuban slave trade,” Odious commerce: Britain, Spain
and the abolition of the Cuban slave trade (1980), pp.298-326

Leslie Bethell, “Changing attitudes and plans of action, 1845-1850,” The abolition of the
Brazilian slave trade: Britain, Brazil and the slave trade question, 1807–1869 (1970), pp.296-
326

33
 Lecture 20: The Memory and Legacies of the Slave Trade
Questions for Consideration
 How has the slave trade been remembered in different parts of the world?
 If slavery has been a constant thread throughout history, is it possible to ever
end the institution?
 Slave trading forts have become monuments to the miseries experienced by
millions of people enslaved through the trans-Atlantic slave trade. In what ways
does this modern perspective reflect historical reality?

Readings: Essential
Louise Shelley, “The Business of Human Trafficking,” Human Trafficking: A Global
Perspective (2010), pp.112-140

Readings: Recommended
Kumie Inose, “What was Remembered and What was Forgotten in Britain in the
Bicententenary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade?” in Hideaki Suzuki ed., Abolitions
as a Global Experience (2015), pp.50-71

Kevin Bales, “The New Slavery,” Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy 3rd
edition (2012), pp.1-33

Alice Bellagambra, “Reasons for Silence: Tracing the Legacy of Internal Slavery and
Slave Trade in Contemporary Ghana” in Ana Lucia Araujo ed., Politics of Memory:
Making Slavery Visible in the Public Space (2012), pp.35-53

James Walvin, “Remembering the Zong,” The Zong: A Massacre, the Law and the End of
Slavery (2011), pp.206-215

Stephen D. Behrendt, “The Transatlantic Slave Trade” in Mark M. Smith and Robert
L. Paquette eds., The Oxford Handbook of Slavery in the Americas (2010)

Marcus Wood, “Supine in Perpetuity: The Description of the Brookes in 2007,” The
Horrible Gift of Freedom: Atlantic Slavery and the Representation of Emancipation (2010),
pp.263-295

David Batstone, “Ending the Slave Trade in Our Time,” Not For Sale: The Return of the
Global Slave Trade- And How We Can Fight It Revised Edition (2010), pp.255-276

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 Appendix I: Essay Writing Guidelines
These are the four basic areas that I will look at as I read and assess your essays.
When you think about your own writing, or when you read your colleagues’ writing, I
suggest that you look at the same elements.

1) Introduction and Thesis Statement: Good essays do more than simply summarize your
reading. They make an argument about the topic under consideration. That argument,
often called a thesis, should show original and critical insight into the topic. A brief,
ambitious and clearly enunciated thesis statement, which is a concise declaration of
your argument, is therefore the heart and soul of any good piece of academic writing.
It tells the reader why you are writing your paper and it offers you a compass point by
which to organize your essay. Your thesis statement should appear very early in your
paper, definitely no later than the end of your introduction.

2) Argument/Organization: Is your thesis clearly and consistently argued throughout

your essay? Does it develop as the piece progresses, taking the reader on a step-by-
step journey, or does it jump around randomly? Does the piece seem to switch sides
somewhere in the middle? How clearly and tightly connected is the presentation of
your ideas? A good essay has an identifiable structure that carries the paper’s overall
argument, beginning with a thesis statement, followed by paragraphs that serve to
illustrate and support the main argument and ending with a conclusion that ties
together the supporting paragraphs. Your transitions should be smooth and each
paragraph should convey a distinct idea.

3) Evidence/Support: How persuasive are you in convincing your readers of the validity
of your position with respect to the text? You should illustrate and support your
arguments with quotations (aptly cited) and examples drawn from the texts you have
read. You must cite your sources anytime you quote directly from a text, anytime that
you paraphrase from a text or anytime that you mention a fact that is not common
knowledge (e.g., numbers and statistics). This practice does much more than simply
show that you have done the work. A key element of academic writing is that it offers
readers a way to learn more about a topic that interests them. That is why your essays
must offer a variety of sources—journals and books, augmented by the Internet—listed
in your footnotes and/or bibliography, where an interested reader might look further
into the topic.

4) Style: How elegantly do you present your ideas? This includes the level of
sophistication in your language, word choice, syntax, spelling, and punctuation. Is the
essay wordy, or does it overuse the passive voice? An easy way to check yourself is to
look for “smug” (spelling, mechanics, usage, grammar) mistakes.
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 Appendix II: Primary Source Databases
Name of Resource
Google Books
Archive.org
Eighteenth-Century Collections Online
Early English Books Online
Elizabeth Donnan, Documents Illustrative of
the History of the trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, 4
vols.
Documenting the Old South
The Geography of Slavery in Virginia
North Carolina Runaway Slave Advertisements, http://libcdm1.uncg.edu/cdm/landingpage/collection/RAS Contains transcriptions of runaway
1750-1840
http://ufdc.ufl.edu/AA00021144/00001
Runaway Slave in Jamaice (I): Eighteenth
Century
Maroonage in Saint Domingue
The Atlantic Slave Trade and Slave Life in the
Americas: A Visual Record
Website Contents
Google.com/books
www.archive.org All of these sites hold numerous
published primary sources on the
Accessible through the Lancaster library website history of slavery and the slave trade
Accessible through the Lancaster library website
http://www.inmotionaame.org/texts/ Donnan collected and transcribed a
plethora of primary sources on the
trans-Atlantic slave trade. The
volumes are broken down as
follows:
1. 1441-1700
2. 1701-1800
3. New England & the Middle
Colonies
4. The Border Colonies and
The Southern Colonies
http://docsouth.unc.edu/ Mostly nineteenth century sources,
but also holds numerous
transcriptions of eighteenth and
seventeenth century sources
http://www2.vcdh.virginia.edu/gos/
slave advertisements in Virginia,
North Carolina, Jamaica, and Saint
Domingue respectively
http://www.marronnage.info/en/accueil.php
http://www.slaveryimages.org/ Contains 1,280 images of Atlantic
slavery and the slave trade.
36