Convicts that were leased to plantations experienced much of the same conditions they were subjected to during enslavement. “The prisoners ate and slept on the bare ground, without blankets or mattresses, and often without clothes.” They were forced to live in their own filth, bloodied floors and vermin infested quarters. Punishments were usually carried out with lashings, however, they were subjected to “natural punishments” such as exhaustion, pneumonia, heatstroke, dysentery, malaria and frostbite. Convicts were more vulnerable than free workers, and paid a greater price.
Alexander Falconbridge served as a surgeon on the ships that transported slaves through the middle passage. He managed to only make four voyages between 1780 and 1787 due to the harsh circumstances he was witnessing, which ultimately led him to write An Account of the Middle Passage. The Middle Passage was the hardest and most dangerous part of the voyage for any slave transported out of Africa. The article carefully describes the strenuous conditions the slaves were in while being in the ships. An analysis of Alexander Falconbridge’s An Account of the Middle Passage reveals how this surgeon’s perspective aided the progression of the abolition movement by showcasing a new perspective of the Middle Passage, and how his purpose was to inform the general public on how dreadful these
The Slave Ship, by Marcus Rediker was wrote in 2007 about the cruel and brutal actions the slaves endured on their journey across the Atlantic Ocean. He states, “this has been a painful book to write, if I have done any justice to the subject, it will be a painful book to read.” Marcus Rediker accomplished exactly that. This book was not only compelling but emotional, heartbreaking, and makes a reader think, how could someone be so cruel to another living being. Within the first couple pages, the book brought me to tears.
Published by Tapestry Press and copyrighted by Xavier University of Louisiana in 2007, Perspectives In African American History And Culture: An Introductory Reader edited by Dr. Ronald Doris, contains a multitude of articles by several authors. All works center on African American history, culture, art, and philosophy. This particular critique will address “Navigating Distant Shores: A Historical Overview” by Dr. Ronald Doris. This article offers a well organized, structured overview of the life of the Africans, from the early 17th century to modern day 21st century who were kidnaped from their motherland and transported across the Atlantic to involuntary build a country.
The Middle Passage was the voyage from Africa to the Americas. This voyage was a horrible experience characterized by cramped areas, rampant disease, hunger strikes, filth (which contributed to ultimately more deaths), and even suicide by those who couldn't tolerate the conditions anymore and jumped overboard. This horrible treatment of slaves it was makes it so significant. In addition, 12.5 million slaves were transported. As a result, this large importation of slaves was responsible for European wealth in the 17th and 18th centuries.
The prisoners in Camp 14 sleep in dirty shacks. Unlike the slaves, they have to eat cornmeal. That 's all that is provided, and most of the prisoners say that it isn 't a enough so most of the time they would eat rats and insects. That is the food and living condition of the slave in Antebellum South and the prisoners in
The detailed descriptions included in primary sources, along with the descriptive and emotional illustrations included in graphic history are crucial elements in studying and understanding the process and history of the transatlantic slave trade. Rafe Blaufarb and Liz Clarke tie both of these together to help readers truly understand this historic tragedy in the book, Inhuman Traffick: The International Struggle Against the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Although different than the standard book that may be used, that simply spews information out in an uncreative and somewhat boring way, this book is a tool that can be chosen in classrooms to teach different aspects of the slave trade. Working together, the primary sources and graphic history
I assert that one way enslaved African
The most reliable document to understand the Middle Passage is document c which was the account of a slave ship doctor named Alexander Falconbridge in 1788 of the Slave Trade of Coast of Africa. This document is reliable because it is a primary source which is “an artifact, a document, diary, manuscript, autobiography, a recording, or other source of information that was created at the time under study”. Besides being a primary source, he was neither a slave owner or a slave, so there wouldn't be much bias towards a group. In his account, he writes about the harsh conditions he witnessed such as slaves being cuffed and held so closely to each other that they could only lie on their sides, buckets for feces, buckets for water, and tubs for food. These conditions lead to diseases such as flux to be spread easily.
On the 8th of this month, I attended a lecture in the UA Poetry Center presented by Dr. Jerome Dotson (an instructor in Africana Studies). The speaker, who obtained a MA in African American Studies and a PhD in History, presented information for this particular lecture on the diets of slaves, and specifically within that, the connotation of pork in their meals. Dr. Dotson began the talk with a brief discussion of ‘roots’ and played a video of Kunta Kinte’s visual explanation of the meaning of food in a slave’s life. The video highlighted what slaves ate, which consisted mostly of grits, roughly ground corn, and pork. Kinte’s video also presented yet another tragedy behind slavery—the nature of chronic underfeeding and hunger.
Charles Johnson's use of journal entries in his novel, The Middle Passage, is a powerful literary device that enhances the impact of the story. By incorporating personal accounts and first-hand experiences of characters, Johnson brings a level of authenticity and emotional depth to the novel that would be impossible to achieve through narration alone. Johnson's use of journal entries in The Middle Passage is a key factor in its ability to convey the horrors of the transatlantic slave trade and the impact it had on the lives of those who were forced to endure it. One of the most striking aspects of The Middle Passage is the vividness and detail with which Johnson portrays the experience of being a slave aboard a slave ship.
Chains linking together slavery and racial discrimination, stimulated the oppression of Africans. Slavery and labor go hand in hand, there would have been “no enslavement without economic need” (Jordan 50). There is two sides to slavery: one group is displaced and exploited so that the other may prosper. Sylviane Diouf’s book Dreams of Africa in Alabama, reiterate how enslaved Africans were forcibly carried across the Atlantic to the United States after the international slave trade was abolished. Dreams of Africa in Alabama recounts the story of the last shipload of captive Africans brought to the United States and their struggles for survival and the preservation of their culture throughout.
But the labor that slaves did was work…ex-slaves expressed about some of the work they done in slavery. (164) Labor also provided the spatial framework of slaveholding
When you hear the phrase, “The Terrible Transformation”, what do you think it means. The Terrible Transformation was the largest forced migration in recorded history. However, this mass movement was an instrumental in the creation of America; England joined the international trade of human being, after establishing settlements in North America. Millions of African Americans are abducted from their homelands, to labor in North American colonies. Their first battle they must face, is the horrific trip across the Atlantic, also known as the “middle passage”; this trip over the Atlantic is so horrible that least a quarter of them die.
When the African-Americans arrived in the Caribbean, they needed to be sold so that they could start working. To sell the slaves, the merchants examined their teeth, felt their arms and legs, touched their genitals, ordered them to walk, turn,
