| This work concentrates on previously un- and understudied aspects of the social history of the middle passage in the Atlantic slave trade. I argue that the middle passage has a social history that can be recovered, and that there are identifiable forces that shaped that history. Slavery on a slaving vessel is conceptualized as a particular form of enslavement that was as much a system as land-based slave systems. Both quantitative and qualitative evidence are used.; As a counter-weight to the prevailing historiography, I open my work with a chapter on the experiences of women on the middle passage. The second chapter considers the experiences of children and infants. The third chapter considers the crew of slaving vessels, and includes a large section devoted to black crewmembers. The second part of the dissertation describes a number of the most important forces that shaped the voyage. Resistance and rebellion, mutiny and survival strategies of both crew and slaves are examined in the context of the constrained stage of the slaving vessel and the prevailing systems of control. The conclusion includes a number of suggestions for further research. |
