The Origins of American Slavery: Freedom and Bondage in the English Colonies (Critical Issue) [Hardcover]

Betty Wood (Author)

Book Description

Series: Critical Issue | Publication Date: April 1997

The Hill and Wang Critical Issues Series: concise, affordable works on pivotal topics in American history, society, and politics.

The Origins of American Slavery is a short analysis that shows the complex rationale behind the English establishment of American slavery in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This new assessment of a pivotal time in the formation of what was to become the United States offers thought-provoking insights into the English influence on the development of the "peculiar institution."

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Though there was no tradition of slavery in England, it was the norm throughout British colonies in North America and the Caribbean by the end of the 17th century. Historian Betty Wood examines the reasons for its spread in this scholarly, but readable, book. She begins by noting that the British believed slavery was appropriate for non-Christian foreigners, and that Africans belonged to that category. Once the need for cheap labor in the Americas became apparent, planters turned to Africa, and slavery, which had once seemed unthinkable, spread throughout the colonies in an unholy alliance of these two factors--racism and economics.

From Library Journal

Wood (Women's Work, Men's Work, Univ. of Georgia, 1995) examines here the causes and development of slavery throughout British America. She shows the philosophical underpinnings of early American slavery in 16th-century British thought and English attitudes concerning West Africans and Native Americans, revealing that the dynamics of early slavery were more complex than commonly supposed?not so much because of racial attitudes as religious differences and labor needs. She traces slavery from the Caribbean region into the Chesapeake Bay area and on into New England and the Middle Colonies, examining each area in terms of its own variations. Of particular interest are Puritan and Quaker opinions regarding slavery, neither sect having had misgivings about the practice or making money from slave trade. This valuable study is recommended for all libraries.?Robert A. Curtis, Taylor Memorial P.L., Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 132 pages
• Publisher: Hill & Wang Pub; 1st edition (April 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0809074567
• ISBN-13: 978-0809074563
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #826,401 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Incomplete treatise, May 9, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: The Origins of American Slavery: Freedom and Bondage in the English Colonies (Critical Issue) (Paperback)

The author does an excellent job of analyzing slavery, ex post facto. There is little information about the roots of slavery, specifically the institutionalization of slavery in Africa, well before Europeans began to use Africans as forced labor. Entire African nations were built on slavery. The American view of slavery is that Europeans went into the bush, captured slaves, and brought them back. Historical documents reflect that the slaves were bought from enormously wealthy and powerful black slave dealers along the Ivory Coast. Scholarly works should include the entire background of slavery if we are to understand this painful part of America's past as well as understand why it continues in parts of Africa to this day. A side note- the word "slave" has Slavic origins. Slaves were of European extract for centuries.

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good book, but could be better, August 22, 1998

By 

Mara Grey "Mara" (Langley, WA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Origins of American Slavery: Freedom and Bondage in the English Colonies (Critical Issue) (Paperback)

Ms. Woods examination of the attitudes that led to enslavement of Africans and Native Americans is well done, but I wish she'd brought out some of the similarity in attitudes toward indigenous European culture, the Irish for instance. The same attitude of being "hardly human," and "savage," the callousness with which they were eliminated from their land in the late 1500's and the slavery that they experienced (200 Irish women were sent to Barbados as wives for black slaves, for instance) points to a bias which was cultural as well as racial. Well worth reading, however.

0 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very satisfactory, June 22, 2009

By 

Darlene R. Starkey "broken-unicorn" - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Origins of American Slavery: Freedom and Bondage in the English Colonies (Critical Issue) (Paperback)

I ordered this for my granddaughter. She needed it for college and couldn't get it locally. We needed it right away. She got it 3 days after I ordered it. I didn't even know this was possible. We did not pay extra for overnight shipping