Untitled - Memorial University of Newfoundland

Even mough postcolonial theory interrogates co lonialist assumptions. it is eviden t thar
eurocentric ideologies were fonnuIated and disseminated long before coloniza tion.
The domination of other nations by the western world did not begin with the
1884 Bertin Conference which stipulated that Europeans could own whatever territory
in Afri ca they oc:cupied ;6 the period of European slave trade had already seen the
do mination of one nation over another . Different fonns of slavery had existed long
before the full-scale transatlan tic slave trade. Enslaving the enemy that had been
defeated in battle was practiced by the Egyptians , Greeks and Romans. Europeans
were enslaved by the Byzantines and Moslems. Domestic slavery wasan acceptab le
way o f life for many people around the world, including some African tribes. It was a
co mmon practice for slavery to be used as a fonn of punishment for crimes invo lving
death; and for the creditor to enslave the debtor and/or his relati ves as collateral until
the debt was paid. Eric R. Wolf, in Europeand rhe People Wirhour Hutory , sugges ts
that during the time prio r to the European slave trade "slavery wasclearl y color-blind­
(195) . Emphasis was IlQ( placed on racial origin per se; howev er , the Europeanslave
trade was definitely different in scope and bad far reaching effects on the Africans that
were enslaved and their culture. Britain' s lucrative enterprise in trading humans began
in 1562 when, acco rding to Claude George in 1M Rise of British Wesr Africa, Captain
John Hawkins' first shipment of three-hundrcd slaves left Sierra Leone in West Afri ca
for the West Indies. 7 The majority of African slaves were shipped under deplorable
conditions to the West Indian islandsand the Americas to work in the sugar and cotton