Summary : ' Slavers Bay '

Heinrich Heine's poem the Slave ship reveals the inhumane and horrible experiences slaves had to go through while traveling on slave ships. At the beginning of the poem the captain Mynheer van Koek of the ship admires his work, for he obtained six hundred slaves "dirt cheap". More than likely, Koek bought the slaves from African leaders who had no problem in trading their own people. Often times African leaders would do this to punish their people, not knowing the lingering effect it would have on the world. Heine's describes how Koek swapped "brandy", "trinkets", and "beads" for the precious life of a slave. In stanza 7, the captain's moment of bliss has finally come to an end we he realizes that the slaves are dieing in substantial numbers,

Harris, Leslie M. In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans in New York City, 1626-1863.

“The Horrors of a Slave Ship,” describes in detail, the tragic experiences of Olaudah Equiano as a captive slave. Equiano suffered many sleepless nights; he was flogged and kidnapped multiple times. In the article, the author is trying to give the reader the feeling by giving details of the brutally floggings and desperation as many slaves suffocated to death as they were placed in an overcrowded deck. Overall, the author tries to give readers their point across of the difficulties in being a captive slave.

The main focus of the document, The Horrors of a Slave Ship, is over a topic of a young boy given the name Gustavus Vassa who shared his story of his own slavery experience. He writes about a journey of heartbreak and terror and all of the restrictions he endured. He first describes the day he was kidnapped, then all of the families he was sold to. At one time he was fortunate to see his sister for a last time before being sold again to another family. Vassa observes the differences and similarities between his culture and the families’ of his owner’s cultures. Towards the end of the document, Vassa describes Africa, and how he was shipped off to a new world. He had to endure the horrors that came with being chained up with the other slaves. The boy described the smell to be unbearable and that many people would choose death their current situations. By the end of the document he portrayed the way that people were being sold in an auction and the despair of agony when they were parted from their loved ones.

Navigating his way through contracts, money, recruiting; William Rhoden makes it clear to readers that the most important aspect of Forty Million Dollar Slaves is the history it includes. Rhoden draws clear parallels between the slave markets and the business of college recruiting. Throughout the novel, he focuses on the struggle for power in the twenty-first century. His book educates African-American athletes about their heritage and encourages future engagement with their community. Focusing on the history of cultural and social oppression, Rhoden argues that black athletes lost sight of sport’s purpose. African American athletes rose to “victory” obtaining the highest ranks of the multi-billion dollar sports industry. Although making millions, athletes were still neglected significant opportunities for leadership and roles in decision making.

The Slave Ship by Marcus Rediker is a great fiction novel that describes the horrifying experiences of Africans, seamen, and captains on their journey through the Middle Passage. The Middle Passage marked the water way in the Atlantic Ocean between Africa and the Americas. The use of slaves provided a great economy for the European countries due to the fact that these African slaves provided free labor while cultivating sugar cane in the Caribbean and America. Rediker describes the slave migration by saying, “There exists no account of the mechanism for history’s greatest forced migration, which was in many ways the key to an entire phase of globalization” (10). This tells us that African enslavement to the Americas causes a complete

The PBS Documentary Slavery by Another Name goes into detail describing one of America’s most disgraceful periods of time. In the video you can see photos and testimonies of people who once lived through the hardship of being an African American at that point in history. Families member tell the stories of their relatives. By doing so maybe it will impact the future generations.

The changes of slavery shown through American history from the eighteenth and nineteenth-century, dealing with the horrific brutality and inhumane treatment accepted by much of society, all of the way up to present day, as we just recently had America’s first black president Barrack Obama elected in 2008, show drastic improvements on a national crisis that can be heavily credited to the great historical abolitionist of their time and even still the modern day abolitionists continuing to fight. The abolitionist movement was not simply pushed forward by groups of individuals who agreed on the basis that slavery and what was going on at the time was wrong, but instead was heavily impacted by key individuals who typically had experienced first person what it was like on the side of the chained captive workers who were seen as nothing more than mere property they owned. And while for a multitude of those held captive the only life they

Blassingame, John W. The Slave Community: Plantation Life in the Antebellum South. New York: Oxford University Press, 1972.

“The Slave Ship: A Human History” written by Marcus Rediker describes the horrifying experiences of Africans, and captains, and ship crewmen on their journey through the Middle Passage, the water way in the Atlantic Ocean between Africa and the Americas. The use of slaves to cultivate crops in the Caribbean and America offered a great economy for the European countries by providing “free” labor and provided immense wealth for the Europeans. Rediker describes the slave migration by saying, “There exists no account of the mechanism for history’s greatest forced migration, which was in many ways the key to an entire phase of globalization” (10). African enslavement to the Americas is the most prominent reason for a complete shift in the

From the moment of capture, African men, women and children endured a relentless chain of pain and abuse. Life onboard the slave ships became a constant battle for survival, as the gruesome conditions below the deck presented formidable physical health problems. Burnside describes the African slaves descent into hell:

The article, The Horrors of a Slave Ship, is first person point of view account of the capturing of Olaudah Equiano. He tells the story of how he was captured from his home while his parents were away to be used as a slave. The article starts off with Olaudah and his sister being captured while their parents were away. They were taken into the woods, tied up, and forced to travel bound without food. After many days of traveling, Olaudah and his sister were separated. From that point he was passed around and finally landed in the hands of his first owner. His first owner was a smith and Olaudah worked in his shop. He was there for about a month

In the book, “Empire for Slavery: The Peculiar Institution in Texas” by Randolph Campbell, the reader is given an inside view of the abhorrent practice known as slavery in the state of Texas during the 1800’s. In the book, Campbell examines the legalities and the monetary aspects in the state of Texas during that time, as well as the causes to provide an explanation why and how slavery came to fruition as well as reasoning for the expansion. It provides the reader with an overall look at the effect that slavery had on both those who were abused and degraded by it and also the effect it had on the slave owners before, during and after the Civil War. This included the time period after Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. The purpose of depicting

I did not know what was going to happen when I boarded the large ship. I knew it was not good for I was a captive to these white people. My imagination did not even come close to how wretched a state we were all going to be a part of for the next sixty days.

In the 1600’s, Slavery played a significant role in European history. The negative aspects that made up the dark times in history are, mainly centered on the brutalizing effects of the enslaved people, which can be best explained by the destroyed family bonds, history of the enslaved people erased, and unjust treatment of the slaves.