Empire's Crossroads By Carrie Gibson

Fluorescent turquoise waters, a vibrant city culture, as well as an unending supply mimosas and sunburns within a resort, which benefits the common wealthy couple looking for a swell time. You see, when people imagine the Caribbean, they probably visualize the soft sands of the Spice Island Beach Resort. Many people see the Caribbean as relaxing paradise with a small culture. What they don’t understand, are the years of history hidden behind the mask of many resorts. In the book entitled “Empire’s Crossroads: A History of the Caribbean from Columbus to the Present Day”, Author Carrie Gibson differentiates how people view the Caribbean nowadays, by altering their visualization with four-hundred pages of rich history and culture, that argues

The first topic starts with the colonization of many countries which reside within the Caribbean. The first settlers arrived in the Caribbean hailing from Europe. The colonist was the famed Christopher Columbus in year 1492. After socializing with the natives, Columbus quickly differentiated the pleasant Tiano tribes from the animalistic Carib’s. Unfortunately for the natives, the Europeans brought disease and a strong military with them, which soon became the ruination for the indigenous population. By the end of the century, disease had wiped out almost all the native

For the Europeans to become wealthy, labor was a necessity, causing the Europeans to engage in the act of slavery. This is where Gibson addresses the second topic. The book claims during the year seventeen-hundred, around 400,000 African slaves were transported to work in sugarcane fields located in Barbados and Jamaica as well. Slavery had only grown larger in the eighteen-hundreds, which meant more profits from all the sugarcane sent back to Europe to sell, only strengthening the economy. Furthermore, the third topic Gibson discusses is how European powers and other countries clashed when trying to claim many of the islands in the Caribbean, causing a crossroads of power. For example, the French revolution occurred after colonization, and many slaves overthrew their leaders on the plantations, which in turn formed the republic of Haiti in 1804. After that, Cuba and Puerto Rico were taken over by Americans in 1898. Years later, Gibson discusses how all the countries within the Caribbean were influenced by a long period of history, making the Caribbean what it is today. Gibson addresses this as her final argument as to why tourists should not believe that the Caribbean is simply a resort location, and nothing more. Gibson uses these topics as examples from the book to help change the way people view the Caribbean, and help them understand a clearer