Other Black Atlantic borders: escape routes, 'mocambos', and fears of sedition in Brazil and French Guiana (eighteenth to nineteenth centuries)

Abstract

Analyzes cultural exchanges and the formation of identities, specifically looking at Maroon societies established on the borders of colonial Brazil and French Guiana. Author identifies forms of micropolitical agency among slaves and escaped (former) slaves in this area in light of Portuguese and French colonial policies in the 18th and 19th c. First, he reconstructs the history of slavery in French Guiana and bordering Brazil, and especially of slave escapes across colonial borders, resulting in Maroon communities, and how the colonial authorities dealt with these escapes. He points out that the created Maroon societies affected and altered the world of those who were still enslaved, as well as of the entire surrounding society. Further he discusses transnational connections, particularly the impact of the Haitian Revolution on slaves, and of other ideas regarding freedom.