Abstract
ABSTRACT This work explores the forced indenture, or engagement, of Africans in the French empire after the 1817 abolition of slaving. Under this system, French merchants purchased captives from African traders, then offered the captives their freedom. Freedom came with a heavy price: the former captive would have to repay the price of his or her redemption from slavery by working on French plantations as indentured labourers for fourteen years. This article traces the beginnings of this labour system in the colonies of Senegal and Ste. Marie, Madagascar, and explores specifically how the system intersected with slaving and slavery. An examination of French and engagés’ perspectives reveals a developing discourse about the boundaries between slavery and free labour in the early nineteenth century. French officials insisted that engagement constituted a free labour practice that liberated engagés from African slaving markets. In contrast, engagés argued that they had been traded as captives and were enslaved to the French. Overall, a study of engagement offers an opportunity to study definitions of slavery and the slave trade in the era of abolition.
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