In the process of Americanizing slaves, Berlin depicts of Richard “King” Carter doing so to his slaves in The Historicizing of the Slave Experience. The process involved the changing of their names so that they would be receptive to orders. Carter wanted to take away the African influence on his slaves, so that they would become less focused on their African roots.
Another event that shaped the mold of the African-American was at Elmina Castle and the town of Elmina. Elmina Castle was where many Africans were at first Christianized, then sold off to slavery. At the castle the Europeans took the African women as wives and mistresses, creating the Euro-African or the Creole (169).
Creoles in North America, utilized their own mix of culture into skills and negotiations for trade. As communities were formed from Creoles, they still were enslaved for the most part, but they did not forget their new found culture, but they spread it on from being relocated.
Dutch Creoles helped to shape the production of the Dutch merchants of Dutch outposts in New Amsterdam or present day New York. The Creoles took advantage of their work and positions. They received independence to a certain extent from the Dutch as well as learning the Dutch language, receive property, start families, become Dutch Christians, and own property
At Jamestown in 1619, as the first slaves came to Virginia, a slave named Anthony Johnson came from the Caribbean to Virginia. He was an indentured servant for about thirty years and became free by purchasing his freedom. After becoming free, he started a family and started his own farm in Northampton County on the Eastern Shore of Virginia. Johnson received a 250-acre headright in 1651. His son John received 550-acres and his other son Richard
The Essay on Term African Slave Trade
The first thing that needs to be established is just how many slaves were brought to the Americas. This has proven to be quite difficult at best. There have been many scholars debate just this subject alone. As you will see, many well known scholars have problems justifying their own estimations or guesses. A quick study of Philip D. Curtin's work: From Guesses to Calculations: Shows his writings ...
received 100-acres (177).
The family was a successful one for a slave of the early 17th century in the Virginia Colony. The ironic event of this whole success story was Johnson held slaves. In 1654, one of Johnson’s slaves, John Casor, escaped the plantation to another neighbor’s house. When Johnson caught word of this, he took Casor to court arguing that Casor’s labor to him was for a lifetime. Johnson won the case and the white neighbor was forced to pay for the charges in the suit. This was truly a turn in 17th century society, but a rare as well.
Berlin also speaks of the transportation of Creoles in the Caribbean to South Carolina and Florida, who worked alongside the indentured servants and spoke English. These traits of having light skin and speaking English did not take away from the conditions of being a slave. Many of the slaves fled from the low country to Spanish Florida. Once in Spanish Florida it was hard for a master to retrieve the slaves back.
Creoles were had a better advantage of all the slaves in the New World. Their strategic ways of embracing culture and language from both Europe and Africa gave them more of advantage to succeed in the quest for their freedom. According to Berlin, the slave trade constructed and reconstructed race in the New World, later creating the American.
In the essay How Africans Became African Americans, Kulikoff explains that many Africans in the Chesapeake Bay colonies of Virginia and Maryland were forced to embrace Anglo-American beliefs, skills, and values. As the African influx began to die down, the plantation sizes grew due to African-Americans reproducing amongst themselves. As a result, the populations of blacks grew, along with tensions, and laws. Racial laws were enacted because of the increased population.
In the forty year span between 1700 and 1740, blacks accounted for 43,000 and 39,000 were black (183).
As the immigration of Africans rose, the American-born blacks were forced to embrace them and make them accustomed to their life, as well as the African-Americans not straying away from culture itself. When African immigrants came to the New World as slaves they became susceptible to illness from the Europeans. Many slaves died upon arrival to the New World due to being exposed to the elements of the winter months. A common bond that they slaves shared was that they all conspired to run away. A master named, Robert Carter had seven of his slaves to run away by canoe across the Rappahannock River. A few Africans formed communities in the wilderness in the 1720s, when black immigration was high and the frontier close to tidewater (185).
The Essay on African American Family Grandmother Education
Cross-Cultural Introspective Culture is the customs, institutions, and achievements of a particular nation, people, or group. My culture has influenced me in many ways. Being an African American woman, I have to strive to the best I can be. My ancestors died, so that I may live a full and wonderful life. I have to take advantage of every opportunity that comes my way. I believe that I am black ...
A community outside Lexington, Virginia was established by blacks. Slaves did intermingle amongst Native Americans.
Revolts by slaves towards their masters were popular in the Tidewater area of Virginia and in Prince George’s County, Maryland. St. Paul’s Parrish in Prince George’s County, Maryland was a site for revolt led by a slave named John Ransom that was eight months in the making for the slaves that inhabited there. Like a later revolt in 1800 of Gabriel’s Rebellion, this was delayed several times and white authorities caught wind of the plot, which was to kill all the white men; marry all the white women; and control the Western and Eastern Shores of Maryland. The conspirator John Ransom was executed with four other followers.
The slave revolts were an indication of the bond the slaves held along with their families. Slave social structure centered on the family (187).
In some regions, the African male population was greater than the women and was a competition for wives. The rate of immigrants was declining in the colony and divisiveness died away. The population of slaves increased as a result of this. Forty three percent of slaves lived on farms in quarters (190).
The quarter was the center for the family every night and during holidays. Slavery forced kinfolk to live close to each other (192).
On larger plantations the family structure was broken up due to family members being sold or their masters moving away, sometimes to the Piedmont from the tidewater or Chesapeake region. The slaves family structure still strived over the adversities that came their way. A British visitor described slave experience as, “the blacks generally meet together and amuse themselves with Dancing to the Banjo. This musical instrument…is made of a Gourd something in imitation of a Guitar, with only four strings.” “Their poetry is like the music-Rude and uncultivated” (193).
The Term Paper on Slave Family In The Antebellum South
Slave Family in the Antebellum South This color line was drawn in the XVII century, when first black slaves were brought to Virginia. Today many historians believe that the first Africans who came to North America in 1619 had an equal status with white servants. White and black servants had a lot in common. Moreover, black and white servants worked and often lived together, which resulted into ...
The songs and entertainment that slaves had were usages that were received from their Masters and Mistresses. What was deemed as a “grotesque” way of expression has become an art form of culture that we embrace today.
