The creation of race spurred simultaneously, with the manifestation of antiblackness; furthermore, one could not set a distinction between various groups of people, without establishing a hierarchy among them. The mere need to differentiate groups stemmed from a hate of groups, who were deemed to be inferior. In his book, Stamped from The Beginning, Ibram X. Kendi explains human hierarchy in the ancient world, where even great philosophers such as Aristotle justified the superiority of Greeks to groups such as Africans, who he described as “burnt faces.” The rationalization of human hierarchy constituted to the production of racist ideals. Kendi argues that race did not exist in the ancient world, but that it created a foundation for race to …show more content…
The Middle Passage refers to the transportation of millions of enslaved Africans through ship, across the Atlantic Ocean. Africans were kidnapped, beaten, chained, then thrown onto a ship with other Africans, from various tribes. The ships were chaotic; moreover, slaves were stripped of their humanity, then placed on a ship with strangers, some even past enemies. Enslaved Africans were packed tightly below the decks of the ship, enduring nausea, malnutrition, grotesque conditions, and mistreatment from the crew. The journey was extensive, lasting almost three months. There are not many accounts of the Middle Passage from slaves, because those who survived were most likely illiterate; however, it is known that the pain endured by the enslaved Africans on the ships to the Americas, is unfathomable. During the Middle Passage, many slaves died from suicide, unhygienic spaces, sickness and starvation. It is estimated that ten to twenty percent of the slaves did not make it to their destination. The conditions were so disgusting that when crew members had to feed the slaves, they could not withstand the smell and could only stay for a matter of minutes. The Middle Passage began the objectification of Africans, who were viewed as a commodity rather than humans. Slaves were addressed as “cargo” because they were no more than property. There were two methods to arranging slaves beneath the deck of the ship: tight packing and loose packing. Tight packing was used in the belief that more slaves would increase profit, despite the risk of deaths. On the other hand, loose packing did not pack as many slaves together, in an effort to preserve bodies, and ultimately, increase profit. Although both were utilized to yield a greater profit, loose packing was the only truly effective method. This notion, that enslaved Africans, were nothing more than a commodity, constituted to the dehumanization of
The African slave lost their humanity from the very moment they boarded the European slave
Middle Passage -- refers to the forced transportation of African people from Africa to the New World as part of the Atlantic slave trade[1] and was the middle portion of the triangular trade voyage. Ships left Europe for African markets, where their goods were sold or traded for prisoners and kidnapped victims on the African coast. Traders then sailed to the Americas and Caribbean, where the Africans were sold or traded for goods for European markets, which were then returned to Europe. The European powers Spain, Portugal, France, England, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Brandenburg, as well as traders from Brazil and North America, all took part in this trade.
In “Slaves and the ‘Commerce’ of the Slave Trade,” Walter Johnson describes the main form of antebellum, or pre-Civil War, slavery in the South being in the slave market through domestic, or internal, slave trade. The slave trade involves the chattel principle, which said that slaves are comparable to chattels, personal property that is movable and can be bought or sold. Johnson identified the chattel principle as being central to the emergence and expansion of slavery, as it meant that slaves were considered inferior to everyone else. As a result, Johnson argued that slaves weren’t seen as human beings and were continually being mistreated by their owners. Additionally, thanks to the chattel principle, black inferiority was inscribed
...served as a pillar in the economy of one of the earliest forms of globalization.”. On the other hand, the documentary provides facts illustrating approximately how many slaves died during this monstrous journey. The book describes the middle passage as the name given to the journey across the Atlantic in which many slaves died. According to the textbook, “In the North, slaves worked as field hands on farms and as domestic servants, dockworkers, and craftspeople in cities. But because of their labor-intensive cash crops, the market for slaves was much more lucrative in the South and the Chesapeake.” The documentary only discusses slavery up to 1800 however as we know slavery continued beyond that year with the cause of the civil war in 1861 which was a war fought over slavery. Overall, I highly recommend watching the documentary as it is educational and entertaining.
conditions aboard ship were dreadful. The maximum number of slaves was jammed into the hull, chained to forestall revolts or suicides by drowning. Food, ventilation, light, and sanitatio...
Olaudah Equiano wrote a novel about slavery and opened the eyes of many oblivious people around the world. His book was very powerful and it served to help during the abolition movement. He believed that the experience of the middle passage was completely demoralizing to Africans (Andrea 195). Referring to his experience, he writes, “I now wished for the last friend, death, to relieve me”. He changed peoples mind as he went deeper and deeper into the details of horrible things encountered during the Atlantic Slave Trade. He also informed readers if the slaves needed to go to the bathroom they would have to do so as they lay there. If the person above you went, their defecates would seep through the boards and land below. As the Atlantic Slave Trade was booming, the crew members started to take better care of the slaves knowing the more they brought back, the more money they would make. They didn’t take care for them because they were humans, they took “care” of them because they were property and damaged property means less
In order to justify keeping an entire race of people enslaved, slaveholders claimed that blacks were inferior to whites, placing them on the same level as livestock and other animals. “There were horses and men, cattle and women, pigs and children, all holding the same rank in the scale of being, and were all subjected to the same narrow examination” (73). The fact is, whites are not naturally superior over blacks. Therefore, slaveholders used a variety of contrived strategies to make their case that blacks were inherently inferior to whites. To...
Slavery dishonored African Americans from being individuals and treated them just as well as animals: no respect and no proper care. For example, Sethe rec...
All were subject to harsh circumstances and the relentless fears of shipwreck and disease outbreaks. It took as long as five to twelve weeks, depending on the weather circumstances and point of departure. The captain and the crew workers treated the slaves like wild animals, giving them barely enough food to survive and leaving them to suffer with lice, fleas, and rats, which led to many diseases (“Middle Passage”). The records stated that about two –thirds of the fatalities were caused by malaria, yellow fever, and intestinal disorders (Postma 25). The enslaved Africans were linked with heavy iron chains around their hands and feet with barely enough room to lie down (Howarth). Constant odors of urine, vomit...
[Slaves] seemed to think that the greatness of their master was transferable to themselves” (Douglass 867). Consequently, slaves start to identify with their master rather than with other slaves by becoming prejudiced of other slaves whose masters were not as wealthy or as nice as theirs, thereby falling into the traps of the white in which slaves start to lose their
On the second leg of this trade slaves were transported to the West Indies, this leg was called the middle passage. This part was horrible for the slaves. About 50% of all the slaves on one ship would not make it to the West Indies because of disease or brutal mistreatment. Hundreds of men, woman and children were cramped together for most of the journey, occasionally able move an almost decent amount.
Majority of the slaves originated from West and Central Africa, mostly Nigeria, Angola, Ghana and the coast of Sierra Leone. Due to this movement, most of the characteristics of African Culture such as their beliefs, music, and traditions, which were moved to America resulted in cultural incorporation. Auctioning of the Africans marked the start of the middle passage. The europeans carried a cargo that contained iron, gunpowder, fabric, and guns, which were exchanged for africans when they landed. After loading their cargo, the Americans embarked on their journey and traded the slaves for other
Also, the ship’s crew often treated the Africans badly; they often whipped them because many of the people resisted and tried to escape from the cargo ship.
The Middle Passage (or Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade) was a voyage that took slaves from Africa to the Americas via tightly packed ships. The trade started around the early 1500s, and by 1654 about 8,000-10,000 slaves were being imported from Africa to the Americas every year. This number continued to grow, and by 1750 that figure had climbed to about 60,000-70,000 slaves a year. Because of the lack of necessary documents, it is hard to tell the exact number of Africans taken from their homeland. But based on available clues and data, an estimated 9-15 million were taken on the Middle Passage, and of that about 3-5 million died. While the whole idea seems sick and wrong, many intelligent people and ideas went in to making the slave trade economically successful.
The concept of race is an ancient construction through which a single society models all of mankind around the ideal man. This idealism evolved from prejudice and ignorance of another culture and the inability to view another human as equal. The establishment of race and racism can be seen from as early as the Middle Ages through the present. The social construction of racism and the feeling of superiority to people of other ethnicities, have been distinguishably present in European societies as well as America throughout the last several centuries.