Three Centuries of Black Life in Slavery in the Caribbean and Latin America

Session Submission Type: Panel

Abstract

This panel explores the lived experiences of enslaved black persons in the Caribbean and Latin America over the course of three centuries. Together these papers address the intersections of race, gender, spirituality, politics and law, resistance, health and medical practice, and labor through case studies of three slave societies. “Queen Leonor's War: Gender and Slave Resistance in Seventeenth-Century New Grenada” by Bradley L. Craig concerns the rise of Queen Leonor Criolla, who led an aggressive campaign against slaveholding estates neighboring the Palenque de Limón. With a focus on women’s leadership and spiritual authority, Craig demonstrates that women were central to struggles for freedom that occurred outside of the law and colonial institutions. “ ‘Smallpox Negroes’: Smallpox Inoculation and the Enslaved Black Body in the British West Indies 1756-1800” by Elise A. Mitchell focuses on smallpox inoculation to understand how it shaped slaves experiences and social relations on plantations. Her paper also contributes to our knowledge of ambivalent British conceptualizations of slave’s bodies. “Caught in the Act: Suicide and Slavery in 19th Century New Granada” by Brandi M. Waters contributes to the growing subfield of slave suicide through an analysis of the 1804 criminal trial against the slave José Julián for attempted suicide in the Spanish colony New Granada. Using this case study she suggests an understanding of slave suicide not as an inherent choice of either strategy or surrender, but as a situational act on a continuum of options slaves faced within and outside of the institution of slavery.

Sub Unit

• ASALH Centennial Annual Meeting and Conference

Chair

• Natanya Duncan, Lehigh University

Individual Presentations

• Queen Leonor's War: Gender and Slave Resistance in Seventeenth-Century New Grenada - Bradley L. Craig, Harvard University

• ‘Smallpox Negroes’: Smallpox Inoculation and the Enslaved Black Body in the British West Indies 1756-1800 - Elise Agatha Mitchell, New York University

• Caught in the Act: Suicide and Slavery in 19th Century New Granada - Brandi M. Waters, Yale University

Commentator

• Natanya Duncan, Lehigh University