2012-2013 Academic Catalog

Dec 07, 2025

2012-2013 Academic Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

HIST 306 - Africans in the Americas, 1500-1888

Type of Course: Lecture, Discussion

The European enslavement of Africans in the early modern period was closely connected to the colonization of the New World. Although slavery was their condition, this course presents Africans as more than just bonded workers. The transformations of their identities, ethnicities, religions and gender roles are key to understand the lives of African-Americans. The African experience will be studied in a hemispheric framework that routinely compares structures and events throughout the Americas. The focus will be on African agency, from the African impact on the transatlantic slave trade, via the cultural practices that slaves transferred from their homelands, to African assertiveness in the New World as expressed in protest and marronage.