How Did The Atlantic Slave Trade Affect West Africa

This goes to show the gravity of impact the population loss had or still has on West Africa. In Walter Rodney’s ‘How Europe Underdeveloped Africa’ he states that “The massive loss to the African labour force was made more critical because it was composed of able-bodied young men and young women. Slave buyers preferred their victims between the ages of 15 and 35, and preferably in the early twenties; the sex ratio being about two men to one woman.” The people, or lack thereof, of West Africa found it very difficult to replenish the population, not to mention the interruption of the family structure in this part of Africa. Like most cultures, in African culture the men are the head of the household and were the chiefs of the various villages. In the absence of these men, many women found it very difficult to survive having lived as housewives and depending on men as the bread winners of the household. As a result, thre was social chaos in the Western part of Africa.

The Atlantic Slave Trade was a part of African history that had made one of it's biggest impact on Africa's relation with the world and more importantly on the inner workings of the country itself due to its large-scale involvement of many of the people in the continent. Although the slave trade was so long ago the impact can still be seen in Africa's social workings within the people, its economy in the local and global market, and within the political landscape of the countries.

The Atlantic Slave Trade was a very important time in history. When the records of the Atlantic slave Trade are reflected upon ,the impacts of the shipboards revolts are often times overseen .Although these revolts did have an immense effect on the political, views of the Slave trade. Richardson’s “shipboard revolts,African Authority,and the Atlantic slave trade”. brings into view the fluctuating causes and effects of shore based, and shipboard insurrection . Because of Richardson occupation it grants him reliability to all of his claims and supports his opinions His profession of studying economics and international ,offers him a profusion amount of education in the countries which were involved in the Atlantic Slave Trade. Richardson expose the indispensable impacts of shipboard revolts , African Leadership on the Atlantic slave trade, the author accomplishes this by painting out the causes an effects of each specific revolt an also by exposing the progress.

Africa was once a thriving and wonderful continent filled with luxurious and wealthy kingdoms, but that had all changed when a new and appalling type of slavery was introduced. Around the 18th century, Africa became an ideal place for Europeans to trade and buy slaves from. The slave trade in Africa seemed to be manageable and somewhat peaceful before the Europeans brought in a new type of slavery. When the Europeans bought slaves from Africans, they kept them as slaves for life which were very different from how long slaves were kept in Africa. Europeans kept slaves in extremely poor conditions and treated them as if they were less than human. These actions caused a great spike in the slave trade all over the world and many

Everyone has their own understanding of what slavery is, but there are misconceptions about the history of “slavery”. Not many people understand how the slave trade initially began. Originally Africa had “slaves” but they were servants or serfs, sometimes these people could be part of the master’s family. They could own land, rise to positions of power, and even purchase their freedom. This changed when white captains came to Africa and offered weapons, rum, and manufactured goods for people. African kings and merchants gave away the criminals, debtors, and prisoner from rival tribes. The demand for cheap labor was increasing, this resulted in the forced migration of over ten million slaves. The Atlantic Slave Trade occurred from 1500 to 1880 CE. This large-scale event changed the economy and histories of many places. The Atlantic Slave Trade held a great amount of significance in the development of America. Africans shaped America by building a solid foundation for the country.

Africa was once abundant with many resources that were highly valued by the people around them. All of this lead to Africa being able to trade for lots of materials they didn't have access too. This allowed many to grow rich but in the end slavery permanently damaged the african society. Africa was part of a system of both regional and international trade however trade affected people's lives in different parts positive and negative.

The two majors drivers that led to the transatlantic slave trade was the European desire for the agricultural products of the Americas and the need for laborers to work the land in the Americas. All participants, besides for the slaves, benefited from the trading.

The life of a slave was an unfair and unjust degrading way to live. "I was often awakened at the dawn of the day by the most heart-rending shrieks, the louder that they screamed the harder they got whipped. Where the blood ran the fastest, there he whipped the longest" (Douglass, 3). Slaves were classified as property; they were inferior

Masters would whip the slaves when they did something that they were not supposed to. Douglass refers to a time when he watched his master hang a slave by her arms and whip her continuously and then left her there to come back for her later. Whipping and lashing are not humane ways of punishment. Both are cruel and unusual and now are illegal under the Constitution. Many slaves would be afraid to attempt to run away, say anything, or do anything that would cause them to get a whipping because of the inhumane punishment that was established. Not only do the masters beat their slaves, they also rank the slaves with the animals. Douglass describes a time when one of his masters died and his property had to be divided between his two children. The evaluators ranked the slaves with the animals which suggests that they were worth no more than the animals. Slaves were also bought and sold like animals. They were bought at auctions or traded from master to master. People today are not bought and sold from person to person. Goods, services, and animals are sold. The slaves owned nothing, and their masters owned the slaves. They did not have rights, they were not citizens and they were not even considered human beings. They had no liberty or pursuit of happiness, and sometimes they did not even get a chance at life. All these rights are stated in the Constitution of the United States today, but the “dehumanizing characteristics of slavery” also took away the rights of the slaves (Douglass

They often tried to convince themselves that slaves weren’t people, that they didn’t have feelings, and that they’re not as human as they were. They treated them as so, not as people but as objects, objects that didn’t have a say on what goes in their life. Slaves weren’t given the same injustices as the slave owners; they didn’t have protection in the sense of the law. They weren’t given any protection at all; they were seen as an animal just because they were physically

African Societies West Africa (Guinea) most of the abused Africans that came to America began in West Africa, or Guinea. Upper Guinea had a culture that reflected contact with the Islamic Mediterranean district, while Lower Guinea remained less cosmopolitan. Servitude in West Africa Bondage existed in West Africa basically as a strategy for conglomerating grounds and wealth, however after contact with Europeans and the establishment of slave-trading posts, the inward slave trade balanced speedily to meet the new demands from abroad.

To increase production, a family had to invest in more labourers and thus increase their share of land. The simplest and quickest way to do this was to invest in slaves. To help service this demand, many early African societies conducted slave raids on distant villages, this was with the idea of having Africans work for Africans but ones of a different ethnic background, and after slavery was abolished by Europe domestic slavery grew, many slaves were made to work on clove plantations in Zanzibar for example.

During the time periods from 19th to 20th centuries, European countries had snatched away most of the lands in Africa from the people of African descent. They felt that they had the right to claim these foreign lands in order to use them for their own reasons. The Europeans considered themselves as far more superior and better than everyone else. They decided to colonize their lands and treated the Africans as the inferior race from then on. Not only did the status of African people become inferior after the colonization, but they were also enslaved by the Europeans. The Europeans wanted to civilize the African people because they looked different from them as of skin tones. Moreover, Africans had lost all of their rights, along with their freedom as a result.

Slavery has played a strong role in African society from as early as prehistoric times, continuing to the modern era. Early slavery within Africa was a common practice in many societies, and was very central to the country’s economy. Beginning around the 7th century, two groups of non-African slave traders significantly altered the traditional African forms of slavery that had been practiced in the past. Native Africans were now being forced to leave the country to be used as slaves. The two major slave trades, trans-Saharan and trans-Atlantic, became central to the organization of Africa and its societies until the modern era. Slavery and the slave trade strongly affected African society, and

The Atlantic slave trade existed from the 16th to the early 19th century and stimulated trade between Europe, Africa, and the Americas. Over 12 million Africans were captured and sold into chattel slavery off the coast of West Africa, and more than 2 million of them died crossing the Atlantic. These outcomes of the slave trade are rarely disputed among historians; the effect of the Atlantic slave trade in Africa, however, is often a topic of debate. Some academics, such as Walter Rodney, insist that Africans were forced to take part in the slave trade, resulting in demographic disruption and underdevelopment in all sectors of Africa. Historian John Thornton acknowledges the negative consequences of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, yet contends that it was merely an expansion of the existing internal slave trade which African rulers engaged in willingly. A final case made by Hugh Thomas completely contradicts Rodney’s thesis, asserting that the slave trade was not solely responsible for decreasing Africa’s population, and furthermore, that it was primarily beneficial to Africa’s economy and politics. The true outcome of the slave trade in Africa lies not entirely in any one of these arguments, but rests rather in a combination of all three. Although the Atlantic slave trade was detrimental to the economic and social development of Africa, the trade benefited a small portion of Africans, who willingly aligned themselves with