The
transatlantic slave trade is largely responsible for bringing to the
Americas enslaved Africans. The slave trade is said to have drawn
between ten and twenty million Africans from their homeland, with
approximately six hundred thousand coming to Jamaica (one of the largest
importer of slaves at the time) between 1533 and 1807.
Referred
to as the triangular trade, it involved three points, Europe, Africa and
the West Indies and represented a complex financial business at its peak
in the 18th century. The cruel and inhumane conditions
experienced by the Africans from their initial capture, their journey
along the middle passage and enslavement in the West Indies demanded
that the slave trade be abolished and slaves be freed.
After
much agitation by anti-slavery individuals and groups in and outside of
the Caribbean, as well as passive and active resistance by the Maroons
as well as the enslaved, the Slave Trade Abolition Bill was passed in
the British House of Lords on the 25th of March 1807.
The
bicentenary of the abolition of the slave trade (2007), in the British
West Indies is being recognized in Jamaica and other regions. In
acknowledgment of this year as an important historical event, the
National Library of Jamaica has compiled a select bibliography of
materials available on this subject in its collections. The National
Library of Jamaica holds a number of materials on the slave trade,
dating as far back as 1671 and publications from each century
thereafter.
The
slave trade has been the subject of extensive scholarship; confronting
issues such as the number of Africans transported to the Americas and
the social, economic and political effects of the trade. These studies
are available in a variety of formats such as manuscripts, books,
newspaper articles and CD-ROMs. In addition to analytical studies of the
slave trade, there are also descriptive materials including narratives
by those directly involved such as freed persons, slave traders and
observers.
This
bibliography is divided into categories according to the type of
material, as follows:
Ø
Books and Pamphlets
Ø
Periodical Articles
Ø
Newspaper References
(Royal Gazette & Jamaica Courant 1805-1806)
Ø
Illustrations
Ø
Manuscripts
Ø
Prints
Ø
Audio-Visual Materials
Each
item is arranged by title, author, publisher and year of publication
along with the Dewey Decimal Classification number assigned. There are a
few newly acquired items uncatalogued at the time of compilation and
therefore do not have a classification number.
This
bibliography is intended for the use of students, researchers, teachers,
librarians and any interested reader.