Was American Slavery Unique?
Harvard alumnus Justin Suran (AB 91) pens a piece for Free Black Thought on the history of chattel slavery. A historical piece adding depth to understanding slavery on a global scale, from ancient Mesopotamia, Greeks, Romans, Africans, and the Islamic trans-Saharan and Indian Ocean slave trades to the Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, English and French. “The British colonies and later the United States were participants in a transcultural system of exploitation and forced labor rooted in the ancient and medieval past and pervasive throughout the Atlantic world by the 1600s.”
Related:
Uniquely Bad—But Not Uniquely American (City Journal, 10/16/20)
