Course Description
The history and historiography of African slavery and how the institution changed over the centuries. An examination of the trans-Saharan, Indian Ocean, and Atlantic slave trades, as well as themes such as economics, state formation, religion, race and ethnicity, gender, and kinship.
Additional Requirements for Graduate Students:
Graduate students will be challenged to read more extensively
and to analyze the texts more thoroughly than undergraduates
and will be graded with higher standards and expectations.
Graduate students will choose one of the following research
options, related to a topic chosen jointly by the instructor
and student: 1) write a formal historiographic essay reviewing
the primary and secondary sources relevant to the research
topic; 2) write several short essays analyzing primary sources
relevant to the topic; or 3) write a formal, journal-style
research essay.
Athena Title
AFR SLAVERY & TRADE
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
The principal objective of the course is to teach students to think critically for themselves about the relationships between the past and the present, to learn to ask questions of the past that enable them to understand the present and mold the future. In general students will be expected to: 1. read a wide range of primary and secondary sources critically. 2. improve skills in critical thinking, including the ability to recognize the difference between opinion and evidence, and the ability to evaluate--and support or refute--arguments effectively. 3. write stylistically appropriate and mature papers and essays using processes that include discovering ideas and evidence, organizing that material, and revising, editing, and polishing the finished papers. 4. demonstrate a mastery of the historical evidence and analytical skills in written exams and formal essays.
Topical Outline
Week One: Introduction to the course and Africa Week Two: The Historiography of African Slavery Week Three: The Historical Debates Week Four: Scriptural Slavery and Gender Week Five: Race, Gender and Slavery in the Abrahamic Religions Week Six: Slavery and Religion in Medieval Islamic West Africa Week Seven: Slavery and Islam in Songhay Week Eight: Race, Gender and Slavery in Northwest Africa Week Nine: Slavery and the Atlantic Slave Trade Week Ten: Slavery and Story-Telling in the Black Atlantic Week Eleven: Abolitionism and the Power of Stories Week Twelve: Slavery and Islam in Nineteenth-Century West Africa Week Thirteen: Slavery, Abolitionism and Imperialism Week Fourteen: Abolitionism, Sierra Leone and Westernization Week Fifteen: Slavery and Concubinage Week Sixteen: Analyzing African Slavery and Servility