Chapter Questions
Chapter 1
What were the early patterns of Amerindian migration to the Caribbean?
What was the social structure of the Tainos?
Discuss the leadership of the Taino community in Hispaniola.
Compare the Tainos and the Caribs.
What systems of forced labour did the Spanish develop for the Tainos?
How do you explain the destruction of the Amerindian population in the Caribbean?
In what ways did the English attempt to break the Spanish monopoly of the Caribbean in the 16 th
century?
What was the role of white indentured servants in the 17th-century Caribbean?
Chapter 2
Why did sugar planters require so much capital to grow cane?
How do you explain the decline in the population of white indentured servants?
Why did Europeans turn to Africa to solve their labour problem in the Caribbean?
Why was the mortality of Africans so high on the Middle Passage?
In choosing their slaves, how significant were planter choices among the different African
ethnicities?
What was the impact of the arrival of African slaves to the Caribbean?
Why was Jamaica so important to the British in the last half of the 17 th century?
In what ways were the Spanish colonies of the 17th century different from the British and French
colonies in the region?
Chapter 3
How significant were the ethnic divisions among enslaved Africans in the Caribbean?
What were the occupational divisions among the enslaved?
2 How significant was gender in Caribbean slave societies?
Why were urban slaves more likely to gain their freedom than the enslaved who worked on the
plantations?
In what ways were skilled slaves treated differently from the rest of the enslaved population?
Did the ‘internal economy’ of the enslaved favour masters or slaves?
How was it possible for the enslaved to have savings?
Did the economic activities of the enslaved help to undermine or support the slave system?
Chapter 4
In what ways were the free people of colour an unintended by-product of Caribbean slave
society?
How do you account for the different demographic position of the free coloureds in the Hispanic
Caribbean?
In what ways were the free coloureds differentiated among themselves?
What did it mean to be a ‘privileged’ free person of colour?
What were the legal disabilities of the free people of colour?
How did the restrictions against the free coloureds change in the French Antilles during the 18th
century?
What were the occupations of the free people of colour?
How would you characterize the relationships between white men and free women of colour?
What were the links between the free coloureds and the enslaved?
Chapter 5
How would you describe white plantation society in the Caribbean?
How significant were absentee owners of plantations in the Caribbean?
Describe the life style of wealthy resident planters. 3
Who were the petits blancs?
Did it matter that many lower-level white plantation employees did not remain on individual
plantations for very long?
What does Thomas Thistlewood’s diary tell us about the relationships between white men and
enslaved women?
How do you explain the relative social fluidity of white society in the Caribbean?
Why was there a flourishing planter class in Cuba and Puerto Rico in the 19th century?
How significant were the differences between the criollos and the peninsulares in 19th-century
Cuba?
Chapter 6
How did enslaved Africans resist the Middle Passage?
What were the aims of the enslaved Africans who revolted against slavery in the Caribbean?
How significant was Tacky’s rebellion in 1760?
How was the 1736 slave conspiracy in Antigua different from African-led rebellions in the
Caribbean?
In what ways did enslaved women resist slavery?
Which of the enslaved was most likely to run away?
Would you agree that the enslaved could affect important areas of their life? If so, how?
Why were Maroons such a problem for the colonial authorities in the Caribbean?
In what ways were Maroons dependent on the plantations they were seeking to flee?
What is your view of the peace treaties the Maroons made with the colonial authorities?
Chapter 7
Why were the divisions in the ruling class of Saint Domingue so significant?
What was the role of the free coloureds in the Haitian Revolution?
Why were whites so opposed to improving the rights of the free people of colour?
4 Discuss the outbreak of the slave rebellion in August, 1791.
How important was Voudou in the outbreak of the rebellion?
Why did the enslaved in Saint Domingue believe that they had already been partly freed?
What was the significance of the destruction of the town of Le Cap?
Why did Toussaint L’Ouverture abandon the Spanish and support the French government?
How do you account for the victory of the enslaved over the Spanish and British forces?
Why did Toussaint institute a system of forced labour when he became Governor of Saint
Domingue?
Why did Napoleon want to get rid of Toussaint?
What were the consequences of the Haitian Revolution in the eastern Caribbean and in Cuba?
Chapter 8
How did Eric Williams change the traditional interpretation of the abolition of the slave trade and
of slavery?
How in turn was the Williams’ thesis critiqued?
What was the role of the Quakers in the abolitionist movement?
How did the abolitionists alter their strategy to get the abolition bill passed?
How did Caribbean planters respond to abolitionist attempts to ameliorate the condition of the
enslaved in the 1820s?
How do you account for the outbreak of the slave rebellions in Barbados, Demerara and Jamaica
in 1816, 1823 and 1831?
Why was the slave rebellion in Jamaica in 1831 so significant?
Why was the Apprenticeship system adopted in the British colonies of the Caribbean?
How did the actions of the enslaved bring about the end of slavery in the French and Danish
Caribbean?
How do you explain the abolition of slavery in Puerto Rico and Cuba? 5
Chapter 9
Why did manumission for the enslaved become more difficult in Cuba in the 19 th century?
How do you explain the growth of the free coloured population in the 19th century?
What was the demographic position of the free people of colour across the Caribbean in the 19th
century?
How did free coloureds in the Caribbean protest against the restrictions imposed on them?
Why did the Assembly in Jamaica turn down the petition of the free coloureds in 1792?
Why did free coloureds in the British Caribbean get full civil rights ahead of the abolition of
slavery?
In what ways did the prospects of the free people of colour improve after emancipation?
Did the attitude of whites toward free coloureds change after emancipation?
What were the racial views of coloureds and blacks after emancipation?
In what ways did colour restrict the social mobility of most people of mixed race after
emancipation?
Chapter 10
Why did the British government establish the Apprenticeship system?
What was the reaction of the apprentices across the Caribbean to the Apprenticeship system?
How did women apprentices resist Apprenticeship?
How did the patronato in Cuba differ from Apprenticeship in the British Caribbean?
What measures did planters across the Caribbean adopt to ensure a steady supply of labour after
emancipation?
What kind of mobility did ex-slaves have after emancipation in the Caribbean?
Why did many freed women withdraw their labour from the plantations?
6 How did ex-slaves respond politically to emancipation?
Discuss the establishment of free villages after emancipation.
What were the conditions for indentured labourers in the Caribbean after emancipation?
Chapter 11
What led to the outbreak of the ‘Guerre Nègre’ in Dominica in 1844?
Why was 1 August 1848 a significant date in Jamaica?
How did a labour strike become a riot in St. Vincent in 1862?
What were the causes of the riot in Tobago in April, 1876?
How do you explain the outbreak of the Confederation riots in Barbados in 1876?
What was the role of women in the riots in the post-emancipation Caribbean?
How were local problems in the parish of St. Thomas in the East symptomatic of difficulties
across Jamaica in 1865?
What was the Jamaican government’s response to the outbreak of the Morant Bay Rebellion?
What were the aims of the freed people in the French Caribbean after emancipation?
How do you account for the 1912 massacre of blacks in Cuba?
Chapter 12
What was the black intellectual milieu in the late 19th-century Caribbean?
Why was Robert Love a significant figure in Jamaica at the end of the 19th and beginning of the
20th century?
What was the importance of the United Negro Improvement Association?
In what ways were some of Marcus Garvey’s ideas contradictory?
What was Marcus Garvey’s impact on Jamaica in the 1930s?
Discuss the early leaders of the Rastafarians.
Why did the Rastafarians become associated with subversion and savagery? 7
In what ways did the Rastafarians change their ideas about repatriation to Africa?
What impact have the Rastafarians had on Jamaican culture?
Discuss the movements that emphasized race pride in the French Caribbean and Cuba.
Chapter 13
What was the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine?
Why was Cuba so important to the United States?
What was the significance of the Treaty of Paris signed in December, 1898?
In what ways was Cuban independence circumscribed at its birth?
Why did the Americans intervene in Cuba so frequently during the first three decades of the 20th
century?
In what ways did the frustrated expectations of the 1933 Cuban revolution lead to Fidel and the
revolution of 1959?
What were the effects of American racial attitudes on the Haitians?
Why was there so much resistance among the Haitians and the Dominicans to the American
presence in their countries?
Chapter 14
What was the effect of the prolonged depression of the late 19th century on West Indian workers?
What were the first organized workingmen’s associations in the West Indies?
Discuss the significance of Herbert Critchlow in British Guiana and Arthur Cipriani in Trinidad.
What effect did Antonio Soberanis Gomez have on the development of the labour movement in
Belize?
What were the causes of the disturbances in the eastern Caribbean in 1935?
What were the principal causes of the riots in Trinidad in 1937?
What led to the riots in Barbados in 1937?
Explain the causes of the riots at Frome estate in Jamaica in 1938.
8 What were the roles of Alexander Bustamante and Norman Manley in the development of the
labour and nationalist movements in Jamaica?
How important were the recommendations of the Moyne Commission?
How did the labour rebellions of the 1930s transform the political and social landscape of the
West Indies?
Chapter 15
Why did Fidel Castro become a proponent of armed insurrection against the military government
of Fulgencio Batista?
Describe the attack on the Moncada barracks in 1953.
What was the significance of Castro’s ‘History will absolve me’ speech in 1953?
What were the structural problems facing Cuba in the 1950s?
How do you explain Castro’s success in ousting Batista?
What were the early acts of Castro’s government and what was their effect?
Why did relations between the U.S. and Cuba become so difficult in the early 1960s?
What was the effect of the failed invasion at the Bay of Pigs?
What was the significance of the Cuban missile crisis?
How did the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989 affect the Cuban revolution?
What were the aims of the Manley government in Jamaica in the 1970s?
How did Maurice Bishop’s People Revolutionary Government transform Grenada?
Chapter 16
Explain the importance of Luis Muñoz Marín for the development of Puerto Rico.
What have been the attempts at regional political and economic integration in the Caribbean?
What was the impact of Rafael Trujillo on the Dominican Republic?
Why did the United States support Trujillo and also François Duvalier in Haiti?
How has the illegal drug trade impinged on the Caribbean? 9
What are the problems with the ‘Puerto Rican model’ of economic development for the
Caribbean?
Why has the Caribbean’s reliance on agricultural exports led to problems for the region?
Explain the problems with the Caribbean’s reliance on mineral exports and on tourism?
What are the threats to the Caribbean environment?
What have been the effects of natural disasters on the Caribbean?
How do you explain the large number of emigrants from the Caribbean at the end of the 19 th and
beginning of the 20th centuries?
How did migration patterns from the Caribbean change after World War II?
What have been the effects of migration in the Caribbean itself?
How would you characterize race relations in the Caribbean?
Chapter 17
For Benítez-Rojo, how did the plantation help to create Caribbean culture?
In what ways was music important for the enslaved?
Discuss the development of calypso in the Caribbean.
How did the Rastafarians influence the development of reggae?
How have writers in the region recognized the significance of the African heritage of the
Caribbean?
How have the folk and the peasantry been important in the work of Caribbean writers?
In what ways has the experience of the Caribbean diaspora been important to Caribbean writers?
How has film in the Caribbean reflected popular culture?
What has been the Cuban contribution to film in the Caribbean?
In what ways has art depicted aspects of popular culture in the Caribbean?
Why have cricket and baseball been so important in the Caribbean?