For over three centuries (16-19th), African-Guyanese lived in a slave society which was socially stratified according to power, prestige, privilege and colour. Each layer of stratification was hierarchically organized along firm boundaries. The structure of slave society looked like a social pyramid. At the top were Whites, comprised of government officials, plantation owners, managers, merchants, clergies, small shop-keepers, craftsmen, and indentured servants. At the second tier were free Blacks and free Coloureds. The latter group was classified or referred to as Mulatto, Quadroon, and Sambo, and so on. This was really a sandwich group of people that served like a social lubricant between the highest and lowest tiers of Guyana’s slave society. At the lowest level were the enslaved Africans, who were further stratified into field, house, skilled and urban slaves. Taken together, the slaves were the products of the plantation system.
The physical setting of the slave society was also stratified. The residential area was divided between the slavers and the enslaved. The slavers lived in the Great House, while the enslaved lived in barracks or logies. The factory area comprised various mills, boiling and curing houses, storage and work sheds, and a distillery. It was in the fields and factory areas that the enslaved spent most of their time.
The rhythm of plantation life of the enslaved was an unenviable one. They spent most of their lives working from daybreak to sunset, cultivating sugar cane as well as performing other tasks, like feeding animals and tending their kitchen gardens. As a consequence, the lives of the enslaved were severely restricted and stunted. Poor health, suicide and death were common. The plantation system was simply a killing field for the enslaved. Birth rates were low, while death rates were high. The average lifespan of the enslaved was about forty years, particularly the lifespan of the field slave. There were some obvious co-relations: as agriculture increased, so did the importation of more slaves; as more enslaved died, the importation of more slaves increased.
A plethora of social prohibitions was placed on the enslaved. They were denied an education. They were not allowed to marry, migrate, or engage in their own cultural and economic activities; at least openly, in their own free time. A number of laws and codes were put in place to ensure that the above restrictions were carried out. In spite of this stern and stubborn structure of slave society, not all enslaved Africans bowed to it. Actually, there were enslaved Africans who saw slavery as too powerful to resist; there were enslaved Africans who questioned slavery, but did not act upon it — at least not openly; and there were enslaved Africans who resisted slavery. There were actually two broad forms of African resistance to slavery: covert and overt. Covert resistance took the forms of laziness, maiming animals, faking sickness, and maroonage. Overt resistance took the forms of direct destruction of plantation property, and revolution. Both forms of resistance were intended to slow down production, to reduce profits, and eventually to abolish slavery. Two famous revolts of the enslaved Africans occurred: in Berbice in 1763, and in Demerara in 1823. The former was led by Cuffy, now the national hero of modern Guyana. There were also, in every Caribbean island, major slave revolts that lasted for months; but two revolts were successful in regard to defeating their masters and ex-slaves controlling their own destiny. The first was in Haiti in 1804, and the second was in St. Croix, Danish West Indies, in 1848. What these revolts, and everyday forms of hidden resistance, did was that they challenged and revealed the insecurities of the authoritarian structure of the plantation system. By late eighteenth century, the sins of slavery and African resistance to slavery began to penetrate the consciousness of the imperialists; and by 1808, various laws were implemented against the trading of Africans across the Atlantic Ocean. Slavery was still in place, but there were signs and signals that this vile institution of human bondage would not operate as normal, or according to business as usual. A number of arguments, attacks — name them as you please — from the Americas, Europe and Africa, from various movements and from various people, emerged to challenge slavery. Chief among them was African resistance in forms of economic, philosophical, religious and humanism, which, when put together, sounded the death knell of slavery in the Americas in different time periods in the nineteenth century. Slavery was abolished in the British Caribbean, including in Guyana, in 1834 with the introduction of apprenticeship, and finally in 1838. Slavery was abolished in the Swedish Caribbean in 1847; in the Danish and French Caribbean in 1848; in the Dutch Caribbean in 1863; in Puerto Rico 1873; in Cuba in 1886; in Brazil in 1888; in the United States in 1865.
Happy Emancipation Day everyone! ([email protected]).
