Middle Passage By Marcus Rediker Sparknotes

The story of countless fatalities and slaves being traded into dehumanization. There was a woman captured from her home into a pungency of fear along with millions. This “epic drama” lasted over the 400 hundred years of the slave trade, taking 12.4 million people through the “Middle Passage” to be sold (Rediker 4-5). It was considered a genocide with 1.8 million deaths. Marcus Rediker, professor and graduate from the University of Pittsburgh relays the story of the slave trade, a treacherous happening through the 17th and 18th century. He captures these events as a magnificent drama, letting people know what kind of hell the slave trade really was. Rediker mentions W.E.B DuBois who was an African-American scholar-activist who claimed

He talks about people such as the Danish, French, English and how they all had their “spheres of influence” that helped the African coast’s trade continue to be “open and competitive” (77-78). Senegambia, Sierre Leone and the Windward Coast, Gold Coast, Bight of Benin, Bight of Biafra, and West-Central Africa were a part of this sphere, as the trading of the slaves went on between the regions. These slaves were key to the institution of slavery as it helped African societies continue to expand with the Atlantic slave trade (77). Olaudah Equiano was one of those traded. Rediker points him out almost directly as he was ripped off his life at only age 11. The experiences on the ship “was central to his life story, as to millions of others” (108). Rediker explains the astonishment and terror in the slave ship and how all were stripped of their humanity, but Equiano had this saying that he came to understand, Igwe bu ke, meaning “multitude is strength” that replenished the idea of survival below the slave

But if a historian, scholar of some sort or someone interested in the aspects of the slave trade, it would definitely be a great read. Rediker is great at giving vigorous detail that makes the reader feel more a part of the slaves history. He dives in deep to what it was really like to build the ships, how slaves would be taken and how they would be treated below deck on a slave ship. Rediker makes sure to make every point clear and in detail; even with the little things in the book like Captain’s and the suffering they would feel by leaving their wives at home. Rediker knows how to address his arguments on both capitalism and the terror of the slave trade, making sure to give it the dramatization it needs. As said before, the audience definitely points more towards scholars and people who are interested in this type of reading. If a high schooler was really keen on a read like this, then it would be a great lesson for them. In the book, Rediker gives enough detail on every topic so it is not needed to have any background knowledge whatsoever, but a little knowledge on the subject of slaves would not hurt before reading. A few reviews from Amazon have talked greatly and not so about Marcus Rediker and his book. D. Gabrielle had said, “Excellent book. Thoughtful, well written, and well researched, but also exciting and absolutely enchanting to read.” While on the other hand someone said, “The