FROM RAVI DEV...... The enthusiastic entry of the English, French, Dutch etc, ensured that some 18 million Africans were eventually dragged across the Atlantic, but the fact that only 600,000 survived at “Emancipation” in 1834 offers a clue to their prior living conditions. The appallingly barbaric treatment, which included stupefying physical brutalisation, destruction of families, wrenching away of languages and cultures etc. demanded the creation of some sort of rationalisation since Europeans were supposed to be “civilised” while doing all of this. In the beginning, slaves who worked alongside white European indentured slaves, were simply defined as “heathens” and could be kept on the margins as such. It was when they started to convert to Christianity that colour became the marker to distinguish them from the “mainstream”. The concept of “race” was created and transmuted into racist practice that relegated and maintained Africans to the margins of society especially from the 18th century onwards.
Posted on: Sun, 28 Jul 2013 16:57:41 +0000
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