‘Enslavement, Emotions and Oppositional Insolence in the Slave Society of British Guiana’

Abstract

ABSTRACT Enslavers utilized various methods of physical and psychological violence to effect emotions of terror and fear in their African captives in order to create and maintain systems of enslavement throughout the Atlantic World. But these methods also produced emotions in the victims which could act against the systems of enslavement. One such emotion was anger and its visible display towards the enslavers was forbidden throughout the Atlantic World. But the extreme domination of enslavement also resulted in challenges to the system. In this article, I will document and analyse visible displays of the emotions of anger and vengeance by the enslaved in the colonies that became British Guiana. The emotion of vengeance in these cases was conducted through open insults which allowed slaves a way to assert themselves and belittle their enslavers. This study is based on documented complaints of the enslaved during the nineteenth century in the colony of British Guiana, housed at the National Archives of the United Kingdom. These documents are unique in the annals of British West Indian slavery as they give voice to the enslaved on a variety of topics.