Slavery in the Caribbean Francophone World: Distant Voices, Forgotten Acts, Forged Identities [Paperback]

DORIS Y. KADISH is a distinguished research professor of romance languages and women’s studies at the University of Georgia.Twelve scholars representing a variety of academic fields contribute to this study of slavery in the French Caribbean colonies, which ranges historically from the 1770s to Haiti's declaration of independent statehood in 1804. Including essays on the impact of colonial slavery on France, the United States, and the French West Indies, this collection focuses on the events, causes, and effects of violent slave rebellions that occurred in Saint-Domingue, Guadeloupe, and Martinique. In one of the few studies to examine the Caribbean revolts and their legacy from a U.S. perspective, the contributors discuss the flight of island refugees to the southern cities of New Orleans, Savannah, Charleston, Norfolk, and Baltimore that branded the lower United States as "the extremity of Caribbean culture." Based on official records and public documents, historical research, literary works, and personal accounts, these essays present a detailed view of the lives of those who experienced this period of rebellion and change.

The material as a whole shows how very rich the subject area is and how much room there is for additional research. The historical events that underlie all of the essays in the volume are ably and succinctly retold by the editor, Doris Kadish, in her introduction. Her concise historical overview of slavery in the French West Indies narrates the complex unfolding of the slave revolts and the revolution in the French Caribbean.

The essays . . . cover disparate topics, but one theme binds them. Each scholar gives more emphasis to participants and their actions in bringing about events rather than to events themselves. Thus some papers focus on slaves' rebellions, especially in Martinique and in Haiti, where the proper term is revolution rather than rebellion. Other papers deal with abolitionist aclS