Slavery in the Caribbean

Slavery in the Caribbean

Caribbean Slavery gave planters and elite in the Caribbean the right to abuse a human by requiring ridiculously long hours of work on the fields and not providing enough nutrition. The article by Kiple and Kiple reviews the state of malnutrition among the slaves and the findings are atrocious. Slaves were lacking basic nutrients such as calcium, fats, and various vitamins. Kiple and Kiple, regardless of these facts, state that according to 18 and 19th century standards, these diets were not poor. Unfortunately I do not think in making this statement, the authors took into account that the standard person was not a slave. Slaves were subjected to physically rigorous work, which uses a substantial amount of calories, so the standard diet would not be fit for a slave, who needs a lot more calories and nutrients to remain healthy under the situation of slavery.

Furthermore, it was only the African slaves who were able to withstand this lifestyle. Before trade began with African slaves, planters were utilizing Indian slaves from areas such as Venezuela and Nicaragua. It was found though, that the Indian slaves were dying very quickly and slave owners then discovered that African slaves were much more resistant to this harsh lifestyle, although their life span was far from long also.

As is logical and expected, the growth of sugar plantations paralleled the growth of slaves. Interesting to me, is how plantation owners often had to buy the slaves on credit because they did not have enough to buy the slaves. A labor force could not be created out of island inhabitants, so planters had to turn to what they referred to as `cheap labor.' Planters also turned to African slaves due to social reasons. Because African slaves were brought from different areas in Africa, they were a very heterogeneous group in terms of language and culture. Therefore, it was more difficult to communicate in large groups among themselves. Instead, the African slaves had to learn the language of the European country that colonized the island. If the plantation owners were to use Creoles as slaves, who spoke one or two languages at most overall, and were a mainly homogeneous group, would communicate a lot easier and more often, making it more difficult for slave and plantation owners to control the Creole group.

A question of whether Africans were chosen to be imported as slaves is presented in racial terms.