Chapter 3 Black People in Colonial North America
Chapter 3 Black People in Colonial North America, 1526 -1763
Bacon’s Rebellion, 1676 (p. 79) n Uprising against colonial elites – Demand for land resources by white indentured servants – Class-based with a biracial alliance n Led to less use of white indentured servants and more dependence on black slaves
III. Plantation Slavery, 1700 -1750 (p. 81) n The Slavery of Roots n Tobacco ~ Chesapeake – Increased demands for labor and slaves • • Racial prejudice exists Fewer white indentured servants available More Africans available Fear of class conflict (coming off Bacon’s Rebellion)
Plantation Slavery, 1700 -1750 (cont. ) n Rice ~ Low-Country – Early settlers were immigrants from Barbados who brought slaves with them • Never any black indentured servants • Enslaved more Indians than other British colonies • West Africans experienced at cultivating rice
Plantation Slavery, 1700 -1750 (cont. ) n Race relations – White fears of revolt (outnumbered by Blacks) – Est. Slave Code • Carolina had strictest in North America in 1698 • Watch patrols • Curfew n Task system – Permitted autonomy without white supervision n Able to preserve more of their African heritage due to more free time
“View of Mulberry Street” n Thomas Coram, “View of Mulberry Street, (House and Street), ” About 1770, Thomas Coram painted the slave quarters and the master’s house at Mulberry Plantation, located near Charleston, South Carolina. The slave cabins with their high-pitched roofs were influenced by West African architecture. SOURCE: Oil on paper, 10 x 17. 6 cm, Gibbes Museum of Art, Carolina Art Association.
Slave Life in Early America (p. 85) Minimal housing n Dress n – Men wore breechcloths (like KK/Toby in Roots) – Women wore skirts • Upper bodies bare (initially) – Children naked until puberty n Heritage and culture – Slave women used dyes made from bark • Decorated cloth with ornaments • Created African-style head-wraps, hats, and hairstyles
IV. Miscegenation and Creolization (p. 87) n Early Chesapeake had much interaction – Africans, American Indians, White Indentured servants – Cultural exchanges part of Creolization and creation of African American children n Miscegenation – interracial sexual contacts – Extensive in British North America in 17 th and 18 th centuries, though less accepted than in other European colonies • British North America had many more white women • Interracial marriages banned by colonial assemblies – Kept white women from having mulatto children – Prevented a legally-recognized mixed-race class
V. The Origins of African. American Culture (p. 88) n Creolization and miscegenation – Created African Americans • Retained a generalized West African heritage – – – – Family structure Kinship Religious ideas African words Musical instruments Cooking and foods Folk literature Folk arts
African Mbanza n This photograph depicts two versions of the African mbanza. They feature leather stretched across a gourd, a wooden neck, and strings made of animal gut. In America, such instruments became known as banjos.
South Carolina Plantation n This eighteenth-century painting of slaves on a South Carolina plantation provides graphic proof of the continuities between West African culture and the emerging culture of African Americans. The religious dance, the drum and banjo, and elements of the participants’ clothing are all West African in origin. SOURCE: Abby Aldrich, Rockefeller Folk Art Museum, Williamsburg, VA.
The Origins of African-American Culture (cont. ) n The Great Awakening (p. 90) – Began process of converting African Americans to Christianity • Evangelical churches welcomed black people – Increased black acculturation – Biracial churches • Segregation and discrimination
George Whitefield n George Whitefield, a founder of the Methodist Church and an emotional preacher, addressed black as well as white audiences during his 1739 tour of Britain’s North American colonies. SOURCE: John Wollaston “George Whitefield” ca. 1770. By courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery, London. © 2004 Artist Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris.
- Slides: 13