Aquil
Muhammad
Professor
Mckinney
History
205
September
29, 2014
The Commodification of Africans
During Slavery
The
commodification of Human Beings, specifically African Slaves, is a common narrative
throughout most dialogues regarding the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. There are a
plethora of Literary works that deal with this reality; however, the theme of
commodification of humans is perfectly represented in one specific book by
Stephanie Smallwood that details the History of the African Slave Trade. In her
book, Saltwater Slavery, Stephanie
Smallwood deals repeatedly with the theme of commodification and dehumanization
of Africans during slavery. Smallwood gives a detailed account of the process
by which slaves were captured, shipped and enslaved; as well as the thorough
approach behind systematically demoting African captives from human beings to
products exchangeable on a global scale. The author shows that the dehumanization
of these beings is caused and perpetuated by three things—the transport of
Africans to foreign lands, the marketplace used to sell these individuals and
the methodical system that inhibited them from integrating into “proper society”.
Smallwood
spends a significant portion of her work detailing the way slaves were
transported from Africa to Europe and America. When the slaves were placed on
the ships, they were put in iron shackles and surrounded by prison walls
(Smallwood 35). Chained together, they were packed like sardines into ships,
with captors trying to fit as many slaves as possible onto any single ship in
order to maximize profit. Smallwood suggests that by packing the slaves in this
way, captors showed their views—in their eyes, these Africans were not human.
She says, “Slaves became, for the purpose of transatlantic shipment, mere
physical units that could be arranged and moved at will.” (Smallwood 68) The
packing of slaves is the first step in the commodification process. By
approaching these peoples as goods to be shipped rather than people, slavers
chipped away at their perceived humanity. Furthermore, Smallwood suggests that
the actual movement of these people from their homeland furthers the process of
dehumanization. She says, “…thereby produced their desired object: an African
body fully alienated and available for exploitation in the American
marketplace.” (122) By placing these people, unwillingly, into ships with
unknown destinations, separated from everything they know, captors alienated
their captives. However, the process did not end there. When slaves stepped off
the slave ships, they were introduced to the marketplace—and the dehumanization
continued.
After
slave ships reached their destinations, slaves were taken to marketplaces.
There, they were unclothed and given a monetary value based on their physical
features and other ‘superficial cues’ (158). Once they were given a price, the
slaves were bid on, sold to the highest bidder and commenced into slavery. Additionally,
a ledger was kept at the marketplace in order to record the sale and transfer
of property from one owner to the next. In Smallwood’s words, the use of this
ledger “reduced an enormous system of traffic in human commodities to a concise
chronicle of quantitative facts.” (71) This marketplace system further
minimized the slaves’ humanity, thus turning them into nothing more than
merchandise. Smallwood says, “The economic exchange had to transform
independent beings into human commodities whose most ‘socially relevant
feature’ was their ‘exchangeability’.” (35) She goes on to say, “”Captives
learned that…their exchangeability on the Atlantic market outweighed any social
value they might have.” (52) With both of these passages, Smallwood shows that
slaves had no rights and they were only as good as the work they could provide,
with no place or value in society. Also, for slaves that were too sick or in
any other way unable to perform the required labor, a secondary market was
available. Many owners went to this market to purchase slaves at lower prices,
hoping that if the slave recovered or improved, they could be sold for a higher
price. (177) This act, similar to that of purchasing a car, fixing it up and
selling it for a higher profit, further shows the commodification of these
slaves. However, not only did the
marketplace directly reduce the worth of the slave by enabling them to be sold;
it also created a mindset that allowed the captors and sellers of these slaves
to believe that they had done nothing wrong. By viewing these people as nothing
more than the sum of their parts, slave owners were given a moral free pass.
They were allowed to profit from the pain and anguish of a people without the
moral burden. The author says, “Buying people who had no evident social value
was not a violation or an act of questionable morality but rather a keen and
appropriate response to an opportunity.” (62) The opportunity Smallwood is
referring to here is the opportunity to profit from the sale and labor of human
beings. But in order to profit, the slaves could not be seen as human beings.
In this way, a cycle arose furthering the distance the Anglo-Americans felt
between themselves and the slaves.
Finally,
a meticulous system was set up that not only dehumanized slaves, but also
perpetuated the mindset enabled by the marketplace. For example, there are many
accounts of slaves that ran away, just to be caught, brought back to their
owners, punished and put back to work.
This system further facilitated the view of slaves as property,
propagating their commodification. Smallwood says,
Physical
incarceration and social alienation played a role; but ultimately the power of
these and other constraints lay not in their immediate material effect but in
the overarching system justifying the commodification of Africans.” (56)
The
transport and exchange of these human beings partially reduced their status as
humans, but the actual system that they were forced in to is what removed this
status all together.
Overall, Stephanie Smallwood’s book
describes the process by which the enslaved Africans’ status as humans was
reduced. This was a three-prong process, consisting of the transport, exchange
and a system of forced hopelessness. Together, the transport and exchange of
these individuals demoted the enslaved Africans from human to commodity.
Furthermore, a system that justified the commodification of slaves while also
instilling a sense of haplessness in those individuals perpetuated the idea
that they were not human. Smallwood suggests that in these ways, the
dehumanization of slaves was achieved.
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