This is a very interesting article, even if it isn't sourced. That itself became a hot topic of discussion in the blog, but the reason I have posted part of the readers' responses is that there were a couple of interesting comments. Hajja Romi
http://colorlines.com/archives/2013/01/10_things_django_wont_tell_you_about_slavery.html 10 Things You Should Know About Slavery and Won’t Learn at ‘Django’ by Imara Jones Much hullabaloo has been made recently about slavery as entertainment in movies like “Django Unchained.” But lost in the discussion is slavery as history, and the simple fact that it was an economic system which seized the economic know-how of Africans in order to construct unimaginable wealth in North America, Europe and throughout the Western Hemisphere. Wealth from the slave trade took Western Europe from being one of the world’s poorest regions to its wealthiest and most powerful in under a century. Though sadistic and macabre, the plain truth is that slavery was an unprecedented economic juggernaut whose impact is still lived by each of us daily. Consequently, here’s my top-10 list of things everyone should know about the economic roots of slavery. 1) Slavery laid the foundation for the modern international economic system. The massive infrastructure required to move 8 to 10 million Africans halfway around the world built entire cities in England and France, such as Liverpool, Manchester and Bordeaux. It was key to London’s emergence as a global capital of commerce, and spurred New York’s rise as a center of finance. The industry to construct, fund, staff, and administer the thousands of ships which made close to 50,000 individual voyages was alone a herculean task. The international financial and distribution networks required to coordinate, maintain and profit from slavery set the framework for the modern global economy. 2) Africans’ economic skills were a leading reason for their enslavement. Africans possessed unique expertise which Europeans required to make their colonial ventures successful. Africans knew how to grow and cultivate crops in tropical and semi-tropical climates. African rice growers, for instance, were captured in order to bring their agricultural knowledge to America’s sea islands and those of the Caribbean. Many West African civilizations possessed goldsmiths and expert metal workers on a grand scale. These slaves were snatched to work in Spanish and Portuguese gold and silver mines throughout Central and South America. Contrary to the myth of unskilled labor, large numbers of Africans were anything but. 3) African know-how transformed slave economies into some of the wealthiest on the planet. The fruits of the slave trade funded the growth of global empires. The greatest source of wealth for imperial France was the “white gold” of sugar produced by Africans in Haiti. More riches flowed to Britain from the slave economy of Jamaica than all of the original American 13 colonies combined. Those resources underwrote the Industrial Revolution and vast improvements in Western Europe’s economic infrastructure. 4) Until it was destroyed by the Civil War, slavery made the American South the richest and most powerful region in America. Slavery was a national enterprise, but the economic and political center of gravity during the U.S.’s first incarnation as a slave republic was the South. This was true even during the colonial era. Virginia was its richest colony and George Washington was one of its wealthiest people because of his slaves. The majority of the new country’s presidents and Supreme Court justices were Southerners. However, the invention of the cotton gin took the South’s national economic dominance and transformed it into a global phenomenon. British demand for American cotton, as I have written before, made the southern stretch of the Mississippi River the Silicon Valley of its era. The single largest concentration of America’s millionaires was gathered in plantations along the Mississippi’s banks. The first and only president of the Confederacy—Jefferson Davis—was a Mississippi, millionaire slave holder. 5) Defense of slavery, more than taxes, was pivotal to America’s declaration of independence. The South had long resisted Northern calls to leave the British Empire. That’s because the South sold most of its slave-produced products to Britain and relied on the British Navy to protect the slave trade. But a court case in England changed all of that. In 1775, a British court ruled that slaves could not be held in the United Kingdom against their will. Fearing that the ruling would apply to the American colonies, the Southern planters swung behind the Northern push for greater autonomy. In 1776, one year later, America left its former colonial master. The issue of slavery was so powerful that it changed the course of history. 6) The brutalization and psychological torture of slaves was designed to ensure that plantations stayed in the black financially. Slave revolts and acts of sabotage were relatively common on Southern plantations. As economic enterprises, the disruption in production was bad for business. Over time a system of oppression emerged to keep things humming along. This centered on singling out slaves for public torture who had either participated in acts of defiance or who tended towards noncompliance. In fact, the most recalcitrant slaves were sent to institutions, such as the “Sugar House” in Charleston, S.C., where cruelty was used to elicit cooperation. Slavery’s most inhumane aspects were just another tool to guarantee the bottom line. 7) The economic success of former slaves during Reconstruction led to the rise of the Ku Klux Klan. In less than 10 years after the end of slavery, blacks created thriving communities and had gained political power—including governorships and Senate seats—across the South. Former slaves, such Atlanta’s Alonzo Herndon, had even become millionaires in the post-war period. But the move towards black economic empowerment had upset the old economic order. Former planters organized themselves into White Citizens Councils and created an armed wing—the Ku Klux Klan—to undermine black economic institutions and to force blacks into sharecropping on unfair terms. Isabel Wilkerson’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book, “The Warmth of Other Suns”, details the targeting of black individuals, as well as entire black communities, for acts of terror whose purpose was to enforce economic apartheid. 8) The desire to maintain economic oppression is why the South was one of the most anti-tax regions of the nation. Before the Civil War, the South routinely blocked national infrastructure protects. These plans, focused on Northern and Western states, would have moved non-slave goods to market quickly and cheaply. The South worried that such investments would increase the power of the free-labor economy and hurt their own, which was based on slavery. Moreover, the South was vehemently opposed to taxes even to improve the lives of non-slaveholding white citizens. The first public school in the North, Boston Latin, opened its doors in the mid-1600s. The first public school in the South opened 200 years later. Maintenance of slavery was the South’s top priority to the detriment of everything else. 9) Many firms on Wall Street made fortunes from funding the slave trade. Investment in slavery was one of the most profitable economic activities throughout most of New York’s 350 year history. Much of the financing for the slave economy flowed through New York banks. Marquee names such as JP Morgan Chase and New York Life all profited greatly from slavery. Lehman Brothers, one of Wall Street’s largest firms until 2008, got its start in the slave economy of Alabama. Slavery was so important to the city that New York was one the most pro-slavery urban municipalities in the North. 10) The wealth gap between whites and blacks, the result of slavery, has yet to be closed. The total value of slaves, or “property” as they were then known, could exceed $12 million in today’s dollars on the largest plantations. With land, machinery, crops and buildings added in, the wealth of southern agricultural enterprises was truly astronomical. Yet when slavery ended, the people that generated the wealth received nothing. The country has struggled with the implications of this inequity ever since. With policy changes in Washington since 1865, sometimes this economic gulf has narrowed and sometimes it’s widened, but the economic difference has never been erased. Today, the wealth gap between whites and blacks is the largest recorded since records began to be kept three decades ago. Deborah Martin12 days ago ...I'm in Staten island and can tell you that most of the people in the Sandy storm mess don't even know that areas like Dongan Hills are named after one of the biggest slave traders in New York, the Rosebank was a slave settlement once and that there were lynchings on Snug Harbor. They look at me in shock when i tell them obliterated African burial grounds on Forest Avenue or that slave ships once pulled into the the port of Coney Island. I ask them to picture the place when the Lenapi Lennai Indians were here in New York Region and how they were mass slaughtered in order for their ancestors to hearken a call to Europe to take the land. You might see them on newscasts speaking of the tragedy and yes, it's terrible but most Black Staten Islanders know (especially the older ones) that going in Dongan Hills or Rosebank was synonymous with having a Louisville slugger upside your head! Reply 3 replies +14 Gwendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. Gwendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. Deborah Martin10 days ago Our ancestors but first and foremost the Lenapi Lennai who were murdered to take that land. There are obliterated African Burial grounds (1850- 1900) on Forest Avenue from the Rose AME Church around the 7-Eleven area and our ancestors walked from Bullops Point in Old Richmondtown to Richmond Terrace to celebrate the 1827 Emancipation of the Slaves in New York. They prepared for weeks and walked, WALKED for two days. The woods out here are thorny! They thought they would be enslaved again if they didn't get out. They left old people behind who wanted them to live for them since they were too old and infirm to make the trek in what was a much more wooded island then. I went to high school on Richmond Terrace and have often wondered exactly where this inn stood. Halls of records have burned down so much is lost but somewhere, the ancestors will make a way out of no way. for us to find it. wendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. wendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyw Gwendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. Gwendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. wendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway Pearl Duncan13 days ago Because this essay is an overview of the “economic roots of slavery,” as the author says, another excellent source is Eric Williams’ “Capitalism and Slavery” and his “From Columbus to Castro: the History of the Caribbean.” Readers can read about the slave trade in Africa, the U.S., the Caribbean and Europe, and this is one author who viewed the trade from an international perspective. Viewed as the international economic enterprise it was, slavery is a massive subject. Eric Williams did his doctoral thesis on slavery and the international slave trade, and like the rest of us who research this subject, he uses primary sources and documents to illustrate his points. His books have a lot of ah-ah moments and it’s amazing that most of his economic source records were found in European archives, not in the U.S. of the Caribbean. Many of the authors who write about this subject find original records in Europe. The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. Gwendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. Gwendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. Gwendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. Gwendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. Gwendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. SamuelBiagetti13 days ago Herbert Klein, "The Atlantic Slave Trade" is good. Richard Dunn, "Sugar and Slaves." As for slavery in the US, there are so many books I really wouldn't know where to start. Gwendoline Fortune13 days ago The literature you request is readily available. A first class university, any HBCU library, even a cursory search on Google. It is important to remember that documentation existed in books, by scholars, long before the Internet. We are fortunate to have this source, but knowledge does not fall off the tree.. Do not expect someone else to drop it into your mouth. Read John Hope Franklin, Howard Zinn, as an opening. I haven't taught for years and sources no longer fall out--without thinking. Search "lack historians, black history. and reams will appear. Begin with the two, above, The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass, --too many to count. D... our sad educational systems, anyway. 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