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The Guianas

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Feb 7th, 2017
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  1. Introduction
  2.  
  3. The Guianas span some nine hundred miles of Atlantic coast in northern South America, from the Orinoco River in the west to the Amazon River delta in the east. The name, from an indigenous word meaning “land of many waters,” is fitting for a region dissected by thousands of rivers and where most people live along the coast. Far off the tourist paths of the Caribbean and Latin American, the Guianas are also understudied, despite having been the scene of intense European imperial rivalries, colonialism, and slavery for several centuries. Though geographically part of South America, the Guiana colonies have historically and culturally been considered part of the circum-Caribbean. Today, the Guianas are made up of three major political territories: the independent Republic of Guyana (formerly British Guiana and composed of Berbice, Demerara, and Essequibo), the Republic of Suriname (a former Dutch colony first established by the English), and French Guiana or Guyane (once a colony and now an overseas department of France and part of the European Union). Home to numerous and diverse indigenous societies, including Arawakan-speaking groups who migrated to the Caribbean islands, the Guianas were “discovered” by Columbus in 1498 on his third voyage to the Americas but became the site of sustained European exploration and conquest only in the early 17th century. In the wake of Sir Walter Ralegh’s wildly exaggerated account of his 1594–1595 voyage, which advanced the myth of a city said to be ruled by a golden king named “El Dorado,” English, Dutch, and French explorers jockeyed for access to the vast region between Spanish claims in the west and Portuguese Brazil in the east. The Dutch were the most successful early colonizers, establishing trading posts and eventually colonies along the Demerara, Essequibo, and Berbice Rivers. They also captured Suriname from the English. Much of the scholarship on the Guianas understandably concentrates on Dutch colonialism and especially on Suriname, where the Dutch established a major slave society by the early 18th century. There is also a growing body of scholarship on Berbice, Demerara, and Essequibo, both under Dutch rule and during the period when the colonies were controlled by Great Britain (1803–1966), when the slave system expanded rapidly until emancipation (1834) and where planters responded to the post-slavery labor crisis by importing large numbers of indentured laborers, primarily from India. The experience of indentured Asian laborers, who also immigrated to Suriname after slavery was abolished there, has also been the subject of much study, both by historians of the Indian diaspora and Caribbean historians. Overall, scholarship on the Guianas is uneven and linguistically fractured, with a large number of works on the Dutch Guianas and especially Suriname, most of which are written in Dutch; a smaller but sizable body of work on British Guiana is in English, and relatively little scholarship has been done on French Guiana, almost of all of which is in French. The historiography of the Guianas thus reflects the region’s historical divisions along imperial and linguistic lines and the persistent effects of colonialism.
  4.  
  5. General Overviews
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  7. General overviews of the Guianas as a whole are virtually nonexistent; Hyles 2014 is a welcome exception and decent introduction to the region. Most overviews focus instead on a narrower geographic subregion, mirroring the Guianas’ historical—and modern—divisions along political and linguistic lines. For the westernmost colonies of Berbice, Demerara, and Essequibo (which were under Dutch and then British rule and which today compose the Republic of Guyana), Thompson 1987 is the best starting point, though it stops in the early 19th century, before Great Britain acquired the colonies and expanded plantation development, and is not based on the most-current research. For the Dutch Guiana colonies, including Suriname, Goslinga 1971 is a dated but useful introduction; Hoefte 2001 is much shorter but more current. Klooster 1997 is broadly focused on the Dutch in the Americas but is still useful for the Guiana colonies. In French, Mam Lam Fouck 2002 is an excellent overview of French Guiana. General histories of the Caribbean, such as Heuman 2014 and the six-volume Sued-Badillo, et al. 1997–2011, and edited collections, such as Palmié and Scarano 2011, sometimes include the Guianas, though usually tangentially. Richardson 1992 is a good introduction to the distinctive geography of the Guianas as compared to the Caribbean islands.
  8.  
  9. Goslinga, Cornelis Christian. The Dutch in the Caribbean and on the Wild Coast, 1580–1680. Anjerpublikaties 12. Assen, The Netherlands: Van Gorcum, 1971.
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  11. The only English-language overview of Dutch colonization in the Guianas.
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  13. Heuman, Gad. The Caribbean. 2d ed. London: Bloomsbury, 2014.
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  15. Widely used, readable, and concise introduction to Caribbean history from the pre-Columbian era to the present, best for classroom use and nonspecialists. Revised and updated from the popular 2006 edition. Limited coverage of the Guianas, like most general histories of the Caribbean.
  16. Find this resource:
  17. Hoefte, Rosemarijn. “The Development of a Multiethnic Plantation Economy: An Introduction to the History of Suriname from circa 1650 to 1900.” In Twentieth-Century Suriname: Continuities and Discontinuities in a New World Society. Edited by Rosemarijn Hoefte and Peter Meel, 1–22. History Reference Center. Kingston, Jamaica: Ian Randle, 2001.
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  19. Succinct introduction to colonial Suriname by one of the region’s leading historians.
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  21. Hyles, Joshua R. Guiana and the Shadows of Empire: Colonial and Cultural Negotiations at the Edge of the World. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2014.
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  23. Comparative history of the English-, Dutch-, and French-speaking territories of the Guianas (today Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana) on the basis of the author’s masters thesis. Emphasizes each region’s precolonial similarities and argues that the different imperial policies of Britain, the Netherlands, and France shaped distinctive colonial and postcolonial cultures.
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  25. Klooster, Wim. The Dutch in the Americas, 1600–1800: A Narrative History with the Catalogue of an Exhibition of Rare Prints, Maps, and Illustrated Books from the John Carter Brown Library. Providence, RI: John Carter Brown Library, 1997.
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  27. Richly illustrated book by a leading scholar of the Dutch Atlantic, written to introduce an exhibit showcasing the John Carter Brown Library’s collection of sources for the Dutch Americas. A good introduction to Dutch activities in the Guianas before the 19th century that also includes a very useful annotated bibliography for further research.
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  29. Mam Lam Fouck, Serge. Histoire générale de la Guyane française. 2d ed. Cayenne, French Guiana: Ibis Rouge Éditions, 2002.
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  31. Comprehensive French-language synthesis of French Guiana’s history by one of the region’s leading historians. Revised and updated edition. Significant attention to indigenous people, slavery, and the effects of French colonialism. The best introduction to French Guiana.
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  33. Palmié, Stephan, and Francisco A. Scarano, eds. The Caribbean: A History of the Region and Its Peoples. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011.
  34. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226924649.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  35. Excellent collection of short essays on a variety of topics in Caribbean history, several of which discuss the Guianas. Accessible enough for classroom use but also useful for scholars.
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  37. Richardson, Bonham C. The Caribbean in the Wider World, 1492–1992: A Regional Geography. Geography of the World-Economy. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
  38. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511560057Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  39. Wide-ranging overview of Caribbean history and geography. Especially useful for comparing the environments of the Guianas to other places in the Caribbean.
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  41. Sued-Badillo, Jalil, Pieter C. Emmer, Franklin W. Knight, Keith O. Laurence, Bridget Brereton, and B. W. Higman, eds. General History of the Caribbean. 6 vols. London: UNESCO, 1997–2011.
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  43. Massive, comprehensive collection of essays on Caribbean history from pre-Columbian societies to the 20th century, with contributions from leading scholars.
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  45. Thompson, Alvin O. Colonialism and Underdevelopment in Guyana, 1580–1803. Bridgetown, Barbados: Carib Research & Publications, 1987.
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  47. Dated but still very useful overview of the colonies that now make up Guyana (Berbice, Demerara, and Essequibo), from precolonial societies through Dutch colonialism. The best introduction to Guyanese history before the 19th century, with significant treatment of indigenous people and slavery.
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  49. Reference Resources
  50.  
  51. There is no specialized bibliography for the Guianas or any of its component regions. Caribbean bibliographies such as Comitas 1977 and the much more up-to-date Mitchell 2012 sometimes include scholarship on the Guianas. Bégot and Bérard 2011 is an excellent guide for researchers of the French West Indies, including French Guiana. The Digitale Bibliografie Nederlandse Geschiedenis is the best guide to scholarship on the Dutch Guianas, with robust search functions. Miller 1999—updated by the annual supplement published in Slavery & Abolition (cited under Journals)—is a comprehensive bibliography of slavery studies, with several works on the slave societies of the Guianas. Scott, et al. 2004 contains several citations for post-emancipation British Guiana.
  52.  
  53. Bégot, Danielle, and Benoît Bérard, eds. Guide de la recherche en histoire antillaise et guyanaise: Guadeloupe, Martinique, Saint-Domingue, Guyane, XVIIe–XXIe siècle. Orientations et Méthodes 21. Paris: Comité des Travaux Historiques et Scientifiques, 2011.
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  55. Robust and massive guide to research on the French Caribbean. Thematically organized with contributions from many of the leading specialists in Caribbean and French Atlantic history. Includes detailed introductions to essential collections in various libraries and archives.
  56. Find this resource:
  57. Comitas, Lambros. The Complete Caribbeana, 1900–1975: A Bibliographic Guide to the Scholarly Literature. 4 vols. Millwood, NY: KTO, 1977.
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  59. Thematically organized guide to works published before 1975 on the Caribbean, including the Guianas. Though dated, still a good starting point for earlier scholarship, especially for anthropology and the Dutch Guianas.
  60. Find this resource:
  61. Digitale Bibliografie Nederlandse Geschiedenis.. Koninklijke Bibliotheek.
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  63. Online bibliography of publications about the Netherlands and its colonies. A collaborative project of the Netherlands’ Koninklijke Bibliotheek (Royal Library) and the Huygens Institute for the History of the Netherlands (formerly known as Repertorium Geschiedenis Nederland). Contains publications in various languages, but the index is in Dutch.
  64. Find this resource:
  65. Miller, Joseph C., ed. Slavery and Slaving in World History: A Bibliography. 2 vols. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1999.
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  67. Comprehensive compilation of nearly four thousand works on slavery and the slave trade from all regions of the world, including the Guianas. The bibliography is updated annually with a supplement published in the journal Slavery & Abolition (cited under Journals) each December. Miller also maintains an online, searchable Bibliography of Slavery and World Slaving, with some 25,000 works.
  68. Find this resource:
  69. Mitchell, Don. Mitchell’s West Indian Bibliography: From 1492 to the Present. 11th ed. 2012.
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  71. Personal, online bibliography of primary sources and scholarship—published in English—on the Caribbean, including the Guianas, arranged alphabetically. Now in its 11th and final edition, it is the most up-to-date bibliography of English-language Caribbean scholarship.
  72. Find this resource:
  73. Scott, Rebecca J., Thomas C. Holt, Frederick Cooper, and Aims McGuinness, eds. Societies after Slavery: A Select Annotated Bibliography of Printed Sources on Cuba, Brazil, British Colonial Africa, South Africa, and the British West Indies. Pitt Latin American. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2004.
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  75. Carefully annotated guide to published primary sources and selected scholarly works on post-emancipation societies, including British Guiana.
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  77. Primary Sources
  78.  
  79. Primary sources for the study of the Guianas, while less familiar than those for better-known Atlantic regions, are rich and increasingly available. Dutch researchers have been especially proactive in developing online guides to sources for the Dutch Atlantic and Dutch Caribbean. The Atlantic World and the Dutch and The Dutch in the Caribbean World are the best starting points for Dutch sources, and Archieven NL is essential for anyone preparing for research in the Netherlands. For French Guiana, Artur 2002 and Bégot and Bérard 2011 (the latter cited under Reference Resources) are indispensable. For British Guiana, the multivolume British Guiana Boundary collection (Tribunal of Arbitration between Great Britain and the United States of Venezuela 1898) is a treasure trove of original documents with English translations. The House of Commons Parliamentary Papers is also an essential source for the history of British Guiana and Guyana. For the history of slavery, Thompson 2002 is a concise and carefully annotated collection of documents, and Burnard 2010 is an essential supplement. The Digital Library of the Caribbean also contains some relevant documents.
  80.  
  81. Archieven NL.
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  83. Database of archival documents available in the Netherlands, with eighty-five participating archives. Searchable in Dutch or English, with document descriptions and some documents themselves available online. The best starting place for anyone planning to do original research in the Netherlands.
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  85. Artur, Jacques François. Histoire des colonies françoises de la Guianne. Edited by Marie Polderman. Espaces Guyanais. Matoury, French Guiana: Ibis Rouge Éditions, 2002.
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  87. Published and annotated edition of Artur’s manuscript “History of the French Guiana Colonies,” a key source of information for historians of French Guiana. Artur was the royal physician in French Guiana from 1736 until 1771.
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  89. The Atlantic World and the Dutch (AWAD).
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  91. Online guide—in English—to primary sources in the Netherlands and abroad about Dutch interactions with Africa and the Americas. Joint project between the Royal Netherlands Institute for Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV), the Netherlands Institute for Heritage, and the National Archives of the Netherlands, intended to promote Dutch Atlantic history. Though the project is incomplete, having ended in 2011 due to lack of funding, it remains a useful and easily navigable guide for researchers.
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  93. Burnard, Trevor. Hearing Slaves Speak. Georgetown, Guyana: Caribbean Press, 2010.
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  95. Introduction to the little-known records of legal officials known as fiscals and protectors of slaves in 19th-century Berbice; these records are archived in the British National Archives at Kew. With near-verbatim transcriptions of slaves’ testimonies, these documents—nearly one hundred of which are transcribed here in full—are some of the best sources for the study of slavery in the Guianas.
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  97. Digital Library of the Caribbean.
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  99. Provides digitized versions of original documents from and about the Caribbean. Materials for the Guianas are limited but include maps, travel narratives, and newspapers. Strongest for the 20th century.
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  101. The Dutch in the Caribbean World, 1670–1870. Huygens ING.
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  103. Collaborative project between the Huygens Institute for the History of the Netherlands (ING) and KITLV. An especially rich guide to collections in the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Curaçao, Suriname, and Guyana, particularly strong on the history of slavery. Also includes a summary of relevant colonial laws.
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  105. House of Commons Parliamentary Papers.
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  107. Invaluable resource for the study of British Guiana and Guyana. Fully text-searchable and available by subscription online via ProQuest.
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  109. Thompson, Alvin O. A Documentary History of Slavery in Berbice, 1796–1834. Georgetown, Guyana: Free Press, 2002.
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  111. Wide-ranging collection of primary documents—many of which have not previously been published—for the history of slavery in Berbice, concentrating on the British colonial period. Includes helpful annotations and an introduction by Guyana’s leading historian of slavery.
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  113. Tribunal of Arbitration between Great Britain and the United States of Venezuela. British Guiana Boundary: Arbitration with the United States of Venezuela; The Case on Behalf of the Government of Her Britannic Majesty. 12 vols. London: Harrison, 1898.
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  115. Massive and very useful collection of documents from various archives, collected by historians as part of the investigation into Great Britain and Venezuela’s dispute over the border between British Guiana and Venezuela. Documents are presented in the original language (usually Dutch) with English translations.
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  117. Journals
  118.  
  119. Articles and reviews of books on the Guianas appear most often in the many journals devoted to the study of the Atlantic world and the Caribbean. These include the New West Indian Guide / Nieuwe West-Indische Gids, the oldest journal devoted to scholarship on the Caribbean, Itinerario, Caribbean Studies, Atlantic Studies, the Journal of Caribbean History, and the Canadian Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies. More-specialized topical journals also feature articles on the Guianas. These include Slavery & Abolition, the leading journal for slavery studies, and Archaeology and Anthropology, published by Guyana’s Walter Roth Museum of Anthropology. The William and Mary Quarterly, though focused mainly on early North American history, includes regular coverage of the Caribbean and occasional articles on the Guianas.
  120.  
  121. Archaeology and Anthropology.
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  123. Electronic journal published by the Walter Roth Museum of Anthropology in Georgetown, Guyana, in cooperation with Boise State University, in Boise, Idaho. Features articles on the Caribbean and especially Guyana. Especially strong coverage of research on Guyana’s indigenous peoples.
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  125. Atlantic Studies.
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  127. Relatively new, multidisciplinary journal published in the United Kingdom twice a year on behalf of the Society for Multi-Ethnic Studies: Europe and the Americas. Occasional coverage of the Guianas.
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  129. Canadian Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies.
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  131. The leading Canadian journal for scholarship on Latin America and the Caribbean, published three times a year.
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  133. Caribbean Studies.
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  135. Multidisciplinary journal published by the Institute of Caribbean Studies at the University of Puerto Rico. Includes articles in English, French, and Spanish. Strongest for the Spanish-speaking Caribbean but sometimes features scholarship on the Guianas.
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  137. Itinerario: International Journal on the History of European Expansion and Global Interaction.
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  139. English-language journal published since 1977 by Leiden University’s Institute for the History of European Expansion. Itinerario is currently also the official journal of the Forum on European Expansion and Global Interaction (FEEGI). The journal and FEEGI focus on European imperialism and colonialism across the globe, including the Caribbean and Latin America.
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  141. Journal of Caribbean History.
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  143. Biannual journal published by the Department of History and Philosophy of the University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica. Focuses primarily on the anglophone Caribbean, including Guyana / British Guiana.
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  145. New West Indian Guide / Nieuwe West-Indische Gids.
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  147. The oldest scholarly journal dedicated to the study of the Caribbean, and one of the most prestigious. Published continuously since 1919, currently by Brill under the auspices of the Royal Netherlands Institute for Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV). Includes regular articles and book reviews on the Guianas from various disciplines, with all content freely available online.
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  149. Slavery & Abolition: A Journal of Slave and Post-Slave Studies.
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  151. The only journal devoted to the study of slavery, antislavery, and emancipation, with regular articles on the Caribbean and the Guianas. The annual bibliographical supplement—a comprehensive list of new books, articles, and other publications from across the world—is especially helpful for researchers.
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  153. William and Mary Quarterly.
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  155. The flagship journal of early American history, published by the College of William and Mary’s Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture. Includes regular—and increasing—coverage of the Atlantic world and the Caribbean, with occasional articles on the Guianas.
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  157. Native Peoples
  158.  
  159. The indigenous peoples of the Guianas—often lumped together as “Amerindians”—have received less attention from scholars than their counterparts in the Caribbean islands or other areas in mainland South America. Nevertheless, the anthropologists, archaeologists, and historians who study the region’s past and current native groups have produced a rich body of work on the Arawaks (Lokonos), Caribs, Warraus (Waros), and other groups. For newcomers, the best introduction is Whitehead 1999, which pays particular attention to changes in native societies as a result of European colonization. Williams 2003 is also a good introduction and is especially strong on Guianese archaeology. Bos 1998 is wide ranging and detailed but is best for readers with some background in the field. Boomert 1984 offers an excellent introduction to the Arawaks during the early colonial period. Heinen and García-Castro 2000, Kars 2011, and the essays in Whitehead and Alemán 2009 are more narrowly focused but are very useful for research on specific topics. Menezes 1979 highlights a range of primary documents relevant to the study of Guyana’s indigenous peoples in the 19th century. Articles on Guianese native peoples are regularly published in Archaeology and Anthropology (cited under Journals) and occasionally in Ethnohistory and the Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology.
  160.  
  161. Boomert, Arie. “The Arawak Indians of Trinidad and Coastal Guiana, c. 1500–1650.” Journal of Caribbean History 19.2 (1984): 123–188.
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  163. Detailed introduction to Guianese Arawaks (called Lokonos today) in the century and a half before significant European settlement. Covers the Arawaks’ origins, the etymology of “Arawak,” their sociopolitical organization, and their interactions with the Spanish, among other topics.
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  165. Bos, Gerrit. Some Recoveries in Guiana Indian Ethnohistory. Amsterdam: Vrije Universiteit Uitgeverij, 1998.
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  167. Wide-ranging and eclectic examination of Guianese indigenous groups, with particular attention to historiographical debates. Best for specialists.
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  169. Heinen, H. Dieter, and Alvaro García-Castro. “The Multiethnic Network of the Lower Orinoco in Early Colonial Times.” Ethnohistory 47.3–4 (2000): 561–579.
  170. DOI: 10.1215/00141801-47-3-4-561Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  171. Focuses on the various native peoples who lived in the Orinoco River delta at the beginning of Spanish colonization. Documents the presence of several distinct “Waraoan-type groups” as well as groups related to the Caribs and Arawaks.
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  173. Kars, Marjoleine. “‘Cleansing the Land’: Dutch-Amerindian Cooperation in the Suppression of the 1763 Slave Rebellion in Dutch Guiana.” In Empires and Indigenes: Intercultural Alliance, Imperial Expansion, and Warfare in the Early Modern World. Edited by Wayne E. Lee, 251–276. Warfare and Culture. New York: New York University Press, 2011.
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  175. Compelling essay by the author of a forthcoming monograph on Berbice’s 1763 slave rebellion, arguing that indigenous groups allied with the Dutch played a central role in suppressing the largest Caribbean slave revolt before the Haitian Revolution. Thoughtful discussion of the complex and shifting relationships among natives, Africans, and Europeans.
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  177. Menezes, Mary Noel, ed. The Amerindians in Guyana, 1803–73: A Documentary History. London: Frank Cass, 1979.
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  179. Dated but still-useful study of British Guiana’s indigenous peoples in the 19th century, with transcriptions of several dozen original documents from the British National Archives and various missionary societies, organized by topic.
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  181. Whitehead, Neil. “Native Peoples Confront Colonial Regimes in Northeastern South America (c. 1500–1900).” In The Cambridge History of the Native Peoples of the Americas. Vol. 3, South America, Part 2. Edited by Frank Salomon and Stuart B. Schwartz, 382–442. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999.
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  183. Excellent introduction to Guianese indigenous peoples under European colonization. Focuses on the relationships between native peoples and Dutch settlers and especially on how native social processes changed over time. Includes a bibliographic essay useful for further research.
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  185. Whitehead, Neil L., and Stephanie W. Alemán, eds. Anthropologies of Guayana: Cultural Spaces in Northeastern Amazonia. Native Peoples of the Americas. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2009.
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  187. Excellent collection of essays from some of the leading anthropologists of the Guianas.
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  189. Williams, Denis. Prehistoric Guiana. Kingston, Jamaica: Ian Randle, 2003.
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  191. The best book-length treatment of archaeology in the Guianas, covering the entire region. Williams founded Guyana’s Walter Roth Museum of Anthropology and conducted extensive archaeological fieldwork in Guyana. Detailed and comprehensive synthesis, with several maps, photographs, charts, and tables.
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  193. European Exploration
  194.  
  195. Europeans first “discovered” the Guianas at the end of the 15th century, when Columbus’s third voyage sailed along the northern coast of South America. Sustained exploration of the Guianas, however, did not begin for more than another century, sparked by the publication of Sir Walter Ralegh’s Discoverie of Guiana, which spread the legend of a golden city, Manoa, said to be located up the Orinoco River and ruled by a golden king, “El Dorado.” After Ralegh, English, French, and especially Dutch explorers visited the Guianas with increasing frequency, trading with native groups and eventually establishing permanent settlements. Lorimer 2006 is the definitive edition of Ralegh’s travel journal and an excellent introduction to early English exploration of the Guianas. Dutch exploration, trade, and early colonization are well documented in Hulsman 2009 (for Dutch readers) and in Goslinga 1971, which remains the best English-language account. Polderman 2004 is a thoroughly researched study of French exploration and colonization of the eastern Guianas, and Mam Lam Fouck 2002 is also useful for the colonization of French Guiana.
  196.  
  197. Goslinga, Cornelis Christian. The Dutch in the Caribbean and on the Wild Coast, 1580–1680. Anjerpublikaties 12. Assen, The Netherlands: Van Gorcum, 1971.
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  199. Though dated, this lengthy book remains the only major English-language overview of early Dutch colonization in the Guianas (and the Caribbean).
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  201. Hulsman, Lodewijk A. C. “Nederlands Amazonia: Handel met Indianen tussen 1580 en 1680.” PhD diss., University of Amsterdam, 2009.
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  203. Very detailed Dutch dissertation that examines the first century of Dutch exploration and trading in the Guianas, with particular attention to Dutch interactions with indigenous peoples.
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  205. Lorimer, Joyce, ed. Sir Walter Ralegh’s Discoverie of Guiana. Works Issued by the Hakluyt Society, 3d ser. 15. London: Hakluyt Society, 2006.
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  207. Definitive version of Ralegh’s travel journal. Meticulously edited and footnoted, comparing the 1596 published edition to Ralegh’s draft manuscript. Also contains an excellent introduction to Ralegh, the text itself, and English exploration in the Guianas.
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  209. Mam Lam Fouck, Serge. Histoire générale de la Guyane française. 2d ed. Cayenne, French Guiana: Ibis Rouge Éditions, 2002.
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  211. Comprehensive introduction to French Guiana, including early exploration and colonization.
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  213. Polderman, Marie. La Guyane française, 1676–1763: Mise en place et évolution de la société coloniale, tensions et métissages. Matoury, French Guiana: Ibis Rouge Éditions, 2004.
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  215. Excellent—and lengthy—introduction to the colonization of French Guiana.
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  217. Slavery
  218.  
  219. Suriname and the western Guiana colonies of Demerara, Essequibo, and Berbice developed into major slave societies during the 18th century, producing sugar, coffee, cotton, and other plantation crops and importing large numbers of captive Africans. Though slavery in the Guianas remains understudied, especially when compared to larger plantation societies in the Caribbean and Brazil, there is a significant and growing body of scholarship that examines slavery in the Guianas, and especially in Suriname, Berbice, and Demerara. Thompson 2002 is the best introduction to slavery in Berbice published since the late 20th century, though its coverage is limited to the early 19th century, when the British controlled the colony. For the Berbice, Demerara, and Essequibo colonies in the 18th century, Thompson 1987 (cited under General Overviews) remains the best general study. Van Welie 2008 offers a succinct introduction to slavery in the Dutch Guianas. Lean 2002 highlights the still-underused sources for the study of slavery in 19th-century Berbice, where enslaved people’s “voices” were preserved better than in most slave societies. Browne 2011 uses an especially rich series of legal records from Berbice to reconstruct the practice and politics of obeah, an Afro-Caribbean spiritual system of healing and divination outlawed by colonial authorities, in Berbice. Oostindie and Van Stipriaan 1995—followed by Gill 2004—emphasizes the central importance of the Guianas’ physical environment and especially the omnipresence of water in shaping slavery there. Candlin 2012 is especially helpful for understanding the role of gender in British Guiana slave society and the opportunities available there to enterprising free women of color. As Draper 2012 reminds us, slavery and the plantation system expanded rapidly in British Guiana in the early 19th century and were quite profitable up to emancipation in 1834.
  220.  
  221. Browne, Randy M. “The ‘Bad Business’ of Obeah: Power, Authority, and the Politics of Slave Culture in the British Caribbean.” William and Mary Quarterly 68.3 (2011): 451–480.
  222. DOI: 10.5309/willmaryquar.68.3.0451Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  223. Microhistory of the events that led to the trial and execution of an enslaved man in Berbice for practicing obeah—an Afro-Caribbean healing practice European colonists likened to witchcraft—and for the murder of an enslaved woman identified as the source of an epidemic. Emphasizes the political and spiritual power of obeah practitioners.
  224. Find this resource:
  225. Candlin, Kit. The Last Caribbean Frontier, 1795–1815. Cambridge Imperial and Post-colonial Studies. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.
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  227. Examines Demerara slave society (along with Grenada and Trinidad, which is the book’s primary focus) as part of Britain’s “last frontier” of colonization in the southern Caribbean. Includes a careful case study of Dolly Thomas, a remarkably mobile free woman of color.
  228. Find this resource:
  229. Draper, Nicholas. “The Rise of a New Planter Class? Some Countercurrents from British Guiana and Trinidad, 1807–33.” Atlantic Studies 9.1 (2012): 65–83.
  230. DOI: 10.1080/14788810.2012.636996Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  231. Argues against the “decline thesis” advanced by Eric Williams and others, showing that the plantation economies of Trinidad and British Guiana flourished after the abolition of the slave trade. Uses the records of the Commissioners of Slave Compensation to trace the rise of a new group of absentee planters who invested in—and profited handsomely from—slavery in British Guiana and especially Demerara.
  232. Find this resource:
  233. Gill, Gordon Eton. “Labor, Material Welfare, and Culture in Hydrologic Plantation Enterprises: A Study of Slavery in the British Colony of Berbice (Guyana).” PhD diss., Howard University, 2004.
  234. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  235. Detailed study of slavery in 19th-century Berbice that emphasizes the role of the physical environment in shaping enslaved people’s living conditions, work environment, and cultural practices.
  236. Find this resource:
  237. Lean, J. H. “The Secret Lives of Slaves: Berbice, 1819 to 1827.” PhD diss., University of Canterbury, New Zealand, 2002.
  238. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  239. Comprehensive history of slavery in 19th-century Berbice, largely on the basis of the rich and underused records of the fiscals and protectors of slaves, in which enslaved people’s testimonies were recorded in great detail. Also includes a wealth of quantitative analysis from punishment records.
  240. Find this resource:
  241. Oostindie, Gert, and Alex Van Stipriaan. “Slavery and Slave Cultures in a Hydraulic Society: Suriname.” In Slave Cultures and the Cultures of Slavery. Edited by Stephan Palmié, 78–99. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1995.
  242. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  243. Emphasizes the unique challenges of plantation development in Suriname in particular and the Guianas in general—where most land used for agriculture was coastal or riverine and thus had to be protected from flooding through elaborate drainage and damming. Argues that “hydraulic slavery” affected enslaved people’s living and working conditions and cultural practices.
  244. Find this resource:
  245. Thompson, Alvin O. Unprofitable Servants: Crown Slaves in Berbice, Guyana, 1803–1831. Kingston, Jamaica: University of the West Indies Press, 2002.
  246. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  247. The best book-length study of slavery in British Guiana, focusing on a group of enslaved people and properties managed by the British Crown and used as an experiment in “amelioration.”
  248. Find this resource:
  249. van Welie, Rik. “Slave Trading and Slavery in the Dutch Colonial Empire: A Global Comparison.” New West Indian Guide / Nieuwe West-Indische Gids 82.1–2 (2008): 47–96.
  250. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  251. Includes a good introduction to slavery in the Dutch Guiana colonies, as managed by the Dutch West India Company (WIC).
  252. Find this resource:
  253. Slave Trade
  254.  
  255. The slave societies of the Guianas—especially Suriname and Demerara—were major markets for African captives during the 17th, 18th, and early 19th centuries, with most captives transported aboard Dutch and British ships. Most scholarship on the slave trade to the Guianas focuses on Dutch slave trading, often in a broader Atlantic or global context. Vos, et al. 2008 provides the best, most recent introduction to the demographics of the Dutch slave trade, while van Welie 2008 offers a useful introduction to Dutch slave trading and slavery in the Atlantic as compared to the Indian Ocean. Postma 1990 is a classic, if dated, work on the Dutch slave trade, most useful when read alongside the author’s 2003 update (Postma 2003). Researchers and teachers will find Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database and its accompanying atlas, Eltis and Richardson 2010, indispensable.
  256.  
  257. Eltis, David, and David Richardson. Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Lewis Walpole Series in Eighteenth-Century Culture and History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2010.
  258. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  259. Beautifully illustrated collection of maps, charts, and graphs, with excellent introductions to virtually every facet of the transatlantic slave trade. Authored by two of the main collaborators responsible for the acclaimed Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database.
  260. Find this resource:
  261. Postma, Johannes. The Dutch in the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1600–1815. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
  262. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  263. The best book-length study of the Dutch slave trade, on the basis of extensive quantitative research. Contains several errors, but updated and revised in Postma 2003.
  264. Find this resource:
  265. Postma, Johannes. “A Reassessment of the Dutch Atlantic Slave Trade.” In Riches from Atlantic Commerce: Dutch Transatlantic Trade and Shipping, 1585–1817. Edited by Johannes Postma and Victor Enthoven, 115–138. Atlantic World 1. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2003.
  266. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  267. Essential supplement to Postma 1990, correcting errors and revising several conclusions in light of new research. Excellent introduction to the Dutch slave trade.
  268. Find this resource:
  269. van Welie, Rik. “Slave Trading and Slavery in the Dutch Colonial Empire: A Global Comparison.” New West Indian Guide / Nieuwe West-Indische Gids 82.1–2 (2008): 47–96.
  270. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  271. Good introduction to the Dutch slave trade and slavery in Dutch colonies, both in the Atlantic, under the Dutch WIC, and in the Indian Ocean, under the Dutch East India Company (VOC). Uses data from the previous version of Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database.
  272. Find this resource:
  273. Vos, Jelmer, David Eltis, and David Richardson. “The Dutch in the Atlantic World: New Perspectives from the Slave Trade with Particular Reference to the African Origins of the Traffic.” In Extending the Frontiers: Essays on the New Transatlantic Slave Trade Database. Edited by David Eltis and David Richardson, 228–249. Lewis Walpole Series in Eighteenth-Century Culture and History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2008.
  274. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  275. Quantitative essay written to accompany the launch of Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, which places the Dutch slave trade in a wide comparative frame. The single-best introduction to the volume and structure of the Dutch slave trade.
  276. Find this resource:
  277. Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database.
  278. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  279. Robust, fully searchable online database that documents every known transatlantic slave ship voyage—more than 35,000 in total. Indispensable resource for the study of the slave trade to any region of the Americas, with dozens of variables to create customized searches. Well suited to classroom use, too, with several sample lesson plans.
  280. Find this resource:
  281. Slave Resistance and Maroons
  282.  
  283. Slave resistance, including studies of rebellions and communities of escaped slaves and their descendants, known as Maroons, has been one of the most vibrant subfields of slavery studies since the 1960s. In the Guianas, most work on slave resistance has concentrated either on the large rebellions in Dutch Berbice (1763–1764) and British Demerara (1823), or on Maroon communities in Suriname and French Guiana, where several Maroon societies have survived into the early 21st century. Kars 2009, together with Kars 2011 (cited under Native Peoples), offers an early glimpse of the author’s much-anticipated book on the little-known rebellion in Berbice in 1763–1764. Da Costa 1997 is an excellent history of the short-lived and brutally repressed rebellion in 1823 in Demerara, as well as a good general history of Demerara slave society. The authority on Maroon communities in the Guianas, especially Suriname and French Guiana, is anthropologist Richard Price, who has written dozens of books and articles on Maroons since the 1970s. Both Price 1975 and Price 1976 are good introductions to the Saramaka Maroons, and Price 1983 and Price 1990 are notable for the author’s foregrounding of Saramaka voices, juxtaposed with other sources. Hoogbergen 1990 is the best account of the Boni Maroons, the largest group never to sign a peace treaty with the Dutch. Moomou 2004 offers a French-language account of the Boni.
  284.  
  285. Da Costa, Emilia Viotti. Crowns of Glory, Tears of Blood: The Demerara Slave Rebellion of 1823. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997.
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  287. Elegantly written study of a major slave rebellion in Demerara, inspired by news of the British Crown’s plans to “ameliorate” slavery and blamed by slave owners on British missionary John Smith, who was sentenced to death for his alleged role in the revolt. Especially helpful for understanding the worldviews of slaves, masters, and missionaries.
  288. Find this resource:
  289. Hoogbergen, Wim. The Boni Maroon Wars in Suriname. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1990.
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  291. Detailed account of the Boni Maroons, one of several Maroon groups in Suriname never to sign a peace treaty with the Dutch. Traces the Boni from their origins in the early 18th century through 1860, concentrating on the last quarter of the 18th century, when the Boni fought protracted battles against Dutch colonizers under their eponymous leader.
  292. Find this resource:
  293. Kars, Marjoleine. “Policing and Transgressing Borders: Soldiers, Slave Rebels, and the Early Modern Atlantic.” New West Indian Guide / Nieuwe West Indische Gids 83.3–4 (2009): 191–217.
  294. DOI: 10.1163/13822373-90002451Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  295. Explores the mutiny of Dutch soldiers during the large and nearly successful 1763–1764 rebellion in Berbice. Rather than fight against the enslaved rebels they were sent to defeat, the soldiers wound up joining them, frustrated by the poor conditions they faced.
  296. Find this resource:
  297. Moomou, Jean. Le monde des marrons du Maroni en Guyane (1772–1860): La naissance d’un peuple, les Boni. Matoury, French Guiana: Ibis Rouge Éditions, 2004.
  298. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  299. French-language overview of the Boni Maroons in Suriname and French Guiana, by an author who himself is Boni. Argues for the importance of using oral tradition to reconstruct the history of the Boni, yet relies almost entirely on (French) written sources.
  300. Find this resource:
  301. Price, Richard. Saramaka Social Structure: Analysis of a Maroon Society in Surinam. Caribbean Monograph 12. Río Piedras, PR: Institute of Caribbean Studies, University of Puerto Rico, 1975.
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  303. Concise yet detailed ethnography of Suriname’s Saramaka Maroons, on the basis of extensive ethnography in a Saramaka village for the author’s doctoral dissertation. Though Price has revised many of his early conclusions in later works, this remains a fine starting point for researchers.
  304. Find this resource:
  305. Price, Richard. The Guiana Maroons: A Historical and Bibliographical Introduction. Johns Hopkins Studies in Atlantic History and Culture. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1976.
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  307. A concise introduction to the history of Maroons in Suriname (the title is misleading), by the leading scholar on Maroon societies throughout the Americas and especially the Saramaka. The bibliography itself—which contains over 1,300 references—and the accompanying essay are necessarily dated but are still quite useful.
  308. Find this resource:
  309. Price, Richard. First-Time: The Historical Vision of an African American People. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983.
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  311. A classic work on the Saramaka Maroons, on the basis of oral histories presented (in English translation) on the top portion of each page, followed by the author’s commentary. Covers Saramakan history from 1685 to 1762.
  312. Find this resource:
  313. Price, Richard. Alabi’s World. Johns Hopkins Studies in Atlantic History and Culture. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990.
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  315. Imaginative and richly detailed history of the Saramaka Maroons, weaving together archival sources and Maroon oral histories and allowing Dutch officials, German Moravian missionaries, and the Saramaka to present their own “voices,” distinguished by different typefaces. Centers on the life and actions of Alibi, a Saramaka chief or captain.
  316. Find this resource:
  317. Post-Slavery Societies
  318.  
  319. In the Guianas, slavery was first abolished in British Guiana in 1834, followed by French Guiana in 1848 and Suriname in 1863. Planters responded to the resulting labor shortages by tightly controlling the rights and mobility of ex-slaves in an attempt to force them to continue laboring on plantations and by importing new indentured laborers from different regions, especially India. Both Adamson 1972 and Moore 1987 are good starting points for British Guiana after emancipation. Moore 1995 explores the cultural conflicts and differences among British Guiana’s ethnic groups in the 19th century. Rodney 1981 is a classic indictment of British colonialism in underdeveloping the Guyanese economy and in producing internal divisions among Guyanese laborers of different origins. For French Guiana, Schloss 2014 examines debates about colonization in the years immediately following the end of the transatlantic slave trade and is one of very few English-language studies on the colony. Spieler 2012 explores French Guiana’s role as a penal colony and the site of imperial experiments in restricting citizens’ legal rights. Redfield 2000 similarly shows how French Guiana’s geographic marginality and political subjugation made possible a variety of technological experiments, from penal reform to space exploration.
  320.  
  321. Adamson, Alan H. Sugar without Slaves: The Political Economy of British Guiana, 1838–1904. Caribbean 13. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1972.
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  323. Classic study of British Guiana’s sugar industry after slavery, which survived despite several economic crises. Charts ex-slaves’ efforts to avoid plantation labor and planters’ attempts to fill labor shortages, ultimately turning to large-scale importation of indentured laborers from China, Portugal, and especially India. Argues that concentration on sugar limited economic development of other sectors.
  324. Find this resource:
  325. Moore, Brian L. Race, Power, and Social Segmentation in Colonial Society: Guyana after Slavery, 1838–1891. Caribbean Studies 4. New York: Gordon & Breach, 1987.
  326. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  327. Social history of British Guiana in the half century after slavery. Argues that race—rather than class, as emphasized in Adamson 1972 and Rodney 1981—was the principal factor in structuring social relationships among whites, ex-slaves, and Indian indentured laborers as well as Chinese and Portuguese immigrants.
  328. Find this resource:
  329. Moore, Brian L. Cultural Power, Resistance and Pluralism: Colonial Guyana 1838–1900. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1995.
  330. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  331. Wide-ranging cultural history of British Guiana after emancipation that shows how the colony’s white minority dominated the majority population—comprising former slaves and recent immigrants from India, China, and Portugal—through various instruments of “cultural power.” Also emphasizes the responses of subordinated groups who resisted white hegemony.
  332. Find this resource:
  333. Redfield, Peter. Space in the Tropics: From Convicts to Rockets in French Guiana. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000.
  334. DOI: 10.1525/california/9780520219847.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  335. Imaginative interdisciplinary study of French Guiana that juxtaposes the colony’s infamous penal colony of Devil’s Island, which functioned from 1852 to 1946, and the French-controlled European space center at Korou, which emerged in the 1960s. A “meditation on place” that explores how French Guiana’s remote, tropical location and political subjugation, first as a colony and then as an overseas department, have allowed for unique technological experimentation of various kinds.
  336. Find this resource:
  337. Rodney, Walter. A History of the Guyanese Working People, 1881–1905. Johns Hopkins Studies in Atlantic History and Culture. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981.
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  339. Completed just before Rodney was assassinated for his political activism in Guyana, this classic study of 19th-century British Guiana explores the predicament of Indian and Afro-Creole laborers. Argues that other historians erred in attributing conflicts between Guyanese of Indian and African descent to inevitable racial tensions, and instead stresses the white planter class’s manipulation of ethnic difference to thwart unified working-class resistance.
  340. Find this resource:
  341. Schloss, Rebecca Hartkopf. “Imagining the ‘Grand Colonial Family’ in French Guiana, 1819–1823.” Atlantic Studies 11.2 (2014): 195–219.
  342. DOI: 10.1080/14788810.2014.893743Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  343. Essay that explores transatlantic debates about the colonization of French Guiana in the years following the end of the slave trade to the colony. Highlights connections between French Guiana, metropolitan France, and other current and former French territories in the Atlantic world.
  344. Find this resource:
  345. Spieler, Miranda Frances. Empire and Underworld: Captivity in French Guiana. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012.
  346. DOI: 10.4159/harvard.9780674062870Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  347. Thoughtful and provocative study of French Guiana and its relationship to metropolitan France, focusing on the colony’s location as a dumping ground for political and common criminals after the French Revolution. Shows how French Guiana became a space where normal French laws did not apply and where the state experimented with various schemes for controlling convicts, ex-slaves, and Maroons.
  348. Find this resource:
  349. Indentured Labor
  350.  
  351. After slavery was abolished, planters in the Guianas faced massive labor shortages as colonial populations declined and ex-slaves and their descendants resisted plantation labor. Planters, especially in British Guiana, responded by recruiting hundreds of thousands of indentured laborers, primarily from Asia and especially India, whose emigrants were known by the British as “coolies.” Indentureship lasted well into the early 20th century and allowed the sugar plantation economy to continue after slavery. The rights and mobility of indentured laborers, who signed contracts that tied them to specific estates for terms of several years at fixed wages, were tightly controlled by colonial officials and plantation management. Laborers faced brutal working and living conditions that have prompted some historians to liken indentureship to slavery, echoing arguments made by its many contemporary critics. Look Lai 1993 is an excellent introduction to indentureship in the British Caribbean as a whole, notable for its treatment of Chinese and Indian immigrants together. Laurence 1994 treats indentureship and Indian migration as matters of colonial and imperial policy. The essays in Mangru 2005, in contrast, offer a variety of perspectives on the experiences of Indian indentured laborers themselves, along with those of the system’s critics. Bahadur 2013 and Shepherd 2002 highlight the particular challenges and considerable dangers women immigrants faced in British Guiana and during transport from India. Hoefte 1998 is an excellent overview of indenture in Suriname, which followed British Guiana’s lead and collaborated with British imperial officials to import indentured laborers. Anderson 2009 attempts to move the study of Indian indentureship away from debates about whether or not the system was simply a new kind of slavery.
  352.  
  353. Anderson, Clare. “Convicts and Coolies: Rethinking Indentured Labour in the Nineteenth Century.” Slavery & Abolition 30.1 (2009): 93–109.
  354. DOI: 10.1080/01440390802673856Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  355. Provocative article that argues Indian indentured migration should not be interpreted as merely a new form of slavery, as much earlier scholarship characterized it, and instead views it as one of several colonial methods of confinement and incarceration.
  356. Find this resource:
  357. Bahadur, Gaiutra. Coolie Woman: The Odyssey of Indenture. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013.
  358. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226043388.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  359. Lucid and very readable account of the lives of indentured women in colonial British Guiana and the gendered challenges they faced, centered on the author’s attempt to reconstruct the life of her great-grandmother, who arrived in Demerara from Calcutta in 1903.
  360. Find this resource:
  361. Hoefte, Rosemarijn. In Place of Slavery: A Social History of British Indian and Javanese Laborers in Suriname. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1998.
  362. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  363. Excellent study of post-slavery plantation labor in Suriname, focusing on the lives of some 34,000 Indian and 33,000 Javanese who immigrated to the colony between the end of slavery and 1939, when the indenture system was ended. Pays particular attention to the perspectives of laborers themselves, especially on Suriname’s largest sugar estate, Mariënburg.
  364. Find this resource:
  365. Laurence, Keith Ormiston. A Question of Labour: Indentured Immigration into Trinidad and British Guiana, 1875–1917. New York: St. Martin’s, 1994.
  366. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  367. Encyclopedic treatment of indentured immigration to Trinidad and British Guiana that focuses on the perspective of colonial and imperial officials and treats indentureship in terms of imperial policy. Relies primarily on Colonial Office and parliamentary records, which reveal little about the lives and thoughts of indentured laborers.
  368. Find this resource:
  369. Look Lai, Walton. Indentured Labor, Caribbean Sugar: Chinese and Indian Migrants to the British West Indies, 1838–1918. Johns Hopkins Studies in Atlantic History and Culture. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993.
  370. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  371. Wide-ranging survey of indentured Asian immigration to the British Caribbean between emancipation and World War I, including Jamaica, Trinidad, and Guiana, which received the majority of migrants. Broad in scope and an excellent introduction to the topic and its early historiography.
  372. Find this resource:
  373. Mangru, Basdeo. The Elusive El Dorado: Essays on the Indian Experience in Guyana. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2005.
  374. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  375. Collection of previously published essays on various facets of Indian indenture in British Guiana, of interest to newcomers and specialists. Includes a very useful bibliography for further research and several appendixes.
  376. Find this resource:
  377. Shepherd, Verene A. Maharani’s Misery: Narratives of a Passage from India to the Caribbean. Cave Hill, Barbados: University of the West Indies Press, 2002.
  378. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  379. Case study of an Indian woman who died onboard a ship from Calcutta (Kolkata) to British Guiana in 1885, after having allegedly been raped by a black crewman who was subsequently prosecuted in Georgetown. Author uses some two-dozen depositions—included in full as appendixes—to reconstruct Maharani’s fatal voyage and as a springboard to consider the broader gendered exploitation that indentured women as a whole faced.
  380. Find this resource:
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