Review (PDF) Abolition: A History Of Slavery And Antislavery
In one form or another, slavery has existed throughout the world for millennia. It helped to change the world, and the world transformed the institution. In the 1450s, when Europeans from the small corner of the globe least enmeshed in the institution first interacted with peoples of other continents, they created, in the Americas, the most dynamic, productive, and exploitative system of coerced labor in human history. Three centuries later these same intercontinental actions produced a movement that successfully challenged the institution at the peak of its dynamism. Within another century a new surge of European expansion constructed Old World empires under the banner of antislavery. However, twentieth-century Europe itself was inundated by a new system of slavery, larger and more deadly than its earlier system of New World slavery. This book examines these dramatic expansions and contractions of the institution of slavery and the impact of violence, economics, and civil society in the ebb and flow of slavery and antislavery during the last five centuries.
Paperback: 484 pages
Publisher: Cambridge University Press; 1 edition (July 27, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0521600855
ISBN-13: 978-0521600859
Product Dimensions: 6 x 1.1 x 9 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
Best Sellers Rank: #514,411 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #221 in Books > History > World > Slavery & Emancipation #1889 in Books > History > Americas > United States > African Americans > Discrimination & Racism #2054 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Sociology > Race Relations
In the United States nowadays mention the word slavery and most people would think of captive African blacks slaving away brutishly and the Civil War that was fought, for among other reasons, to free them.Anyone versed in history will know that every great civilization, Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Chinese and others were built on slavery. It was the cornerstone. Caesar conquered Gaul to steal accumulated wealth and enslave thousands to guarantee the fortune he needed to succeed in politics.This book, brilliantly written, covers slavery from the Middle Ages to the end of the Second World War. He could have brought the story of slavery up to the present time for slavery still exists in some regions of the world. Perhaps in his next book.Meanwhile we have this gem. The historical breath is striking, examples fly off the pages and one is transported to worlds many do not know existed. The history is horrid, the prospect of repetition, a possible reality, is frightening.Examples abound in history. In the late 1600s thousands of Englishmen were captured on the high seas and sold as slaves by Muslims in North Africa. They joined other captured souls from France, the American colonies, Ireland, Spain, and Scotland. In Africa they joined hapless citizens from Iceland, Russia, Eastern Europe and Italy. They had invariably been "secured" by Italian slave merchants who sold them to both Christians and Muslims.They were a commodity.The numbers were not insignificant. From 1600 to 1750 there were over 20,000 British and Irish citizens enslaved in North Africa. Some were lucky to be ransomed; most weren't. Their existence was brutish.Drescher's book concentrates on slavery in the Americas.
Abolition: A History of Slavery and Antislavery The Children of Africa in the Colonies: Free People of Color in Barbados in the Age of Emancipation (Antislavery, Abolition, and the Atlantic World) Antigua and the Antiguans: A Full Account of the Colony and its Inhabitants (Cambridge Library Collection - Slavery and Abolition) The West Indies in 1837: Being the Journal of a Visit to Antigua, Montserrat, Dominica, St. Lucia, Barbados, and Jamaica (Cambridge Library Collection - Slavery and Abolition) Emancipation in the West Indies: A Six Months' Tour in Antigua, Barbados, and Jamaica, in the Year 1837 (Cambridge Library Collection - Slavery and Abolition) The Amelioration and Abolition of Slavery in Trinidad, 1812 - 1834: Experiments and Protests in a new Slave Colony You Are All Free: The Haitian Revolution and the Abolition of Slavery Slavery and Abolition in Early Republican Peru (Latin American Silhouettes) Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa (African Studies) Native America: A Concise Guide To Native American History - Native Americans, Indian American, Slavery & Colonization (Crazy Horse, Custer, Slavery, American Archaeology, Genocide, Aztec) Signatures of Citizenship: Petitioning, Antislavery, and Women's Political Identity African Canadians in Union Blue: Volunteering for the Cause in the Civil War (American Abolitionism and Antislavery) The Scorpion's Sting: Antislavery and the Coming of the Civil War Fifty Years Later: Antislavery, Capitalism and Modernity in the Dutch Orbit "New Negroes from Africa": Slave Trade Abolition and Free African Settlement in the Nineteenth-Century Caribbean (Blacks in the Diaspora) White Creole Culture, Politics and Identity during the Age of Abolition (Cambridge Studies in Historical Geography) Freedoms Given, Freedoms Won: Afro-Brazilians in Post-Abolition São Paolo and Salvador Women's Rights Emerges within the Anti-Slavery Movement, 1830-1870: A Brief History with Documents (The Bedford Series in History and Culture) History: Human History in 50 Events: From Ancient Civilizations to Modern Times (World History, History Books, People History) (History in 50 Events Series Book 1) History: British History in 50 Events: From First Immigration to Modern Empire (English History, History Books, British History Textbook) (History in 50 Events Series Book 11)
