Slavery:
Quantitative and Cartographical
Approaches
AM103
David Lambert
26 October 2015
Slavery in the Americas
Slavery in the Americas
Lecture structure
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•
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Slave narratives
Broader histories
Quantitative approaches to history
Maps and history
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database
Slave narratives
• Is it possible for us to “hear” the voices of
people who were enslaved in different parts
of the Americas?
• What problems will we encounter if we try to
do so?
• Does it matter?
Olaudah Equiano, or,
Gustavus Vassa, the African
‘The stench of the hold while we were on the coast was so intolerably
loathsome, that it was dangerous to remain there for any time, and
some of us had been permitted to stay on the deck for the fresh air;
but now that the whole ship’s cargo were confined together, it became
absolutely pestilential. The closeness of the place, and the heat of the
climate, added to the number in the ship, which was so crowded that
each had scarcely room to turn himself, almost suffocated us. This
produced copious perspirations, so that the air soon became unfit for
respiration, from a variety of loathsome smells, and brought on a
sickness among the slaves, of which many died, thus falling victims to
the improvident avarice, as I may call it, of their purchasers. This
wretched situation was again aggravated by the galling of the chains,
now become insupportable; and the filth of the necessary tubs, into
which the children often fell, and were almost suffocated. The shrieks
of the women, and the groans of the dying, rendered the whole a
scene of horror almost inconceivable’.
The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus
Vassa…, pp 51-52 (1794; 9th edition).
Enslaved Africans disembarked in the
Americas, 1501-1866
Destination
Number
British Caribbean
French Caribbean
Spanish Caribbean
Dutch Caribbean
Danish Caribbean
Caribbean sub-total
Brazil
Spanish Mainland
North America
The Americas - total
2,318,252
1,120,216
805,424
444,728
108,998
4,797,618
4,864,374
487,488
388,747
10,538,227
% of Caribbean subtotal
% of total for the
Americas
48.32%
23.35%
16.79%
9.27%
2.27%
100.00%
22.00%
10.63%
7.64%
4.22%
1.03%
45.53%
46.16%
4.63%
3.69%
100.00%
Quantitative vs qualitative research
‘Quantitative research is, as the term suggests, concerned with
the collection and analysis of data in numeric form. It tends to
emphasize relatively large-scale and representative sets of data,
and is often, falsely in our view, presented or perceived as being
about the gathering of “facts”. Qualitative research, on the other
hand, is concerned with collecting and analysing information in
as many forms, chiefly non-numeric, as possible. It tends to focus
on exploring, in as much detail as possible, smaller numbers of
instances or examples which are seen as being interesting or
illuminating, and aims to achieve “depth” rather than “breadth”.’
L. Blaxter, C. Hughes and M. Tight,
How to Research, 1996 , p. 61.
Why quantify?
‘Numbers are a powerful tool in the hands of those
who decide to gather them and to use them. In
history, numbers play a key role in setting up
debates and arguments and in creating
periodisations and chronologies. Numbers are so
central in history and in social science that they
cannot be left to be gathered, manipulated and
analysed by a restricted group of specially
numerate academics’.
Pat Hudson, History by Numbers, 2000, p. xvii.
Cliometrics
Enslaved Africans disembarked in the
Americas, 1501-1866
Destination
Number
British Caribbean
French Caribbean
Spanish Caribbean
Dutch Caribbean
Danish Caribbean
Caribbean sub-total
Brazil
Spanish Mainland
North America
The Americas - total
2,318,252
1,120,216
805,424
444,728
108,998
4,797,618
4,864,374
487,488
388,747
10,538,227
% of Caribbean subtotal
% of total for the
Americas
48.32%
23.35%
16.79%
9.27%
2.27%
100.00%
22.00%
10.63%
7.64%
4.22%
1.03%
45.53%
46.16%
4.63%
3.69%
100.00%
Enslaved Africans disembarked in the
Americas, 1501-1866
Spanish
Mainland
5%
Brazil
46%
North
America
4%
Caribbean
45%
James Walvin, Atlas of
Slavery (2006)
‘The aim is to illustrate the
key features of a history of
slavery in their defining
geographical setting…What
follows is above all an
attempt to illustrate the
historical geography of
slavery…Maps alone cannot
explain the full detail of that
history, and the
accompanying text seeks to
explain the finer points of
the historical account…’ (pp
xiii-xiv)
Maps as historical evidence
Maps as historical evidence
Using maps to show location
Using maps to demonstrate
importance of physical geography
Using maps to show historical trends
Using maps to show flows
Using maps to make comparisons
‘[A]cademic scholarship on transatlantic slavery can
schematically be divided between two opposed
theoretical camps: first, what may be called the
“humanist and narrative historians” who emphasize the
human experience of slavery and the trade slave and
whose focus is frequently the gradual abolition of
slavery; and, second, the “quantification historians”
who take a statistical and macrohistorical approach and
avoid the human aspect, which they associate with a
lack of critical distance’.
Raphael Hörmann and Gesa Mackenthun (eds), Human
Bondage in the Cultural Contact Zone (Waxmann,
2010), p. 11.
Group A (11-12) – come
with me after lecture and
return to H3.03 for 1
Group B (12-1) – meet
outside Humanities
Building by 12
Anna Connolly
Kate Padiachy
Nick Jackson
Phoebe Studdert-Kennedy
Diane Musabi
Mallory Thorpe
Cat Brice
Arsalan Jamshid
Laura Cross
Priya Shah
Edward May
Rae Walsh
Lucy Wainman
Holly Beth Rodgers
Daniella Tobit
Georgia Caird
Rhys Hillan
Mauricio Arrechea
Toby Rees
Tom Morrison
Alfred Twyman
Ruth Andrew