Overseen and Overlooked: Spanish and British Silencing of Labor Resistance in Post-Emancipation Puerto Rico

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article focuses on the reception and effects of the post-emancipation forced labour system in Puerto Rico (1873–1876) and contributes to the global understanding of the transition from slavery to coerced labour in the nineteenth century. Through an analysis of local reports, metropolitan responses, and archival documentation, I examine the ways both Spanish and British colonial administrators obscured and shaped the historical record through their promotion of the narrative of absolute success of the contracting system and minimization of widespread reports of newly-emancipated libertos’ (freedpeople’s) challenges to it. In addition to interrogating the colonial reporting strategies utilized, motivations for narrative silencing, and the consequent effects on the historiography of Puerto Rican emancipation, the article provides glimpses of liberto resistance that constitute direct contradictions to the dominant narrative.