Select and write from one of the questions below. These papers should seek to answer the question itself with attention to specifics and nuances employed and the contexts broader illustration of the history of the era that informs the document. Your paper can consider the following issues:
the changes over time
the content of the passage (what)
authorship/ audience (who and who for)
the historical context in which it was produced (When, where, and why)
how historians have approached and interpreted the history
the challenges of dealing with the source/ author
You must use at least one secondary source from the list of suggestions (properly referenced in MLA/Chicago style) to construct your paper. There must be at least two references consulted and quoted in the paper (you may use outside sources, but you are REQUIRED to reference at least one of the suggested sources).
Question #1:
Even though there was a significant indigenous presence in the region, the Caribbean did not exist as a specific historical space before the arrival of Christopher Columbus in 1492. Using the writings of Christopher Columbus discuss how the first European encounters influenced future ideas about the Caribbean? How did Columbus and conquistadors motives shape the narratives of the New World and Caribbeanness?
Secondary Sources:
Matthew Restall, The Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest (2003)
Eric Williams, From Columbus to Castro: The History of the Caribbean (1984)
Carrie Gibson, Empires Crossroads: A history of the Caribbean from Columbus to the Present Day (2014)
Question #2:
The arrival of Europeans is often discussed as a simple event: Europeans land, the conquest of the Caribbean is successful, and indigenous populations are decimated. Drawing from the three primary sources, explain how the idea of conquest is complicated by Afro/Indigenous experiences. What do these documents tell us about these moments? What myths do they dispel?
Secondary Sources:
Charles Beatty-Medina, Between the Cross and the Sword: Religious Conquest and Maroon Legitimacy in Colonial Esmeraldas in Sherwin K. Bryant, Rachel Sarah OToole, and Ben Vinson III, Africans to Spanish America: Expanding the Diaspora (2012)
John K. Thornton, Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800 (1997)
David Wheat, Atlantic Africa and the Spanish Caribbean, 1570-1640 (2018)
Question #3:
In the 17th century the introduction of sugar completely changed the Caribbean region. The economic, social, and political changes associated with the introduction of export crops is often called a Revolution. What made introduction of monoculture agriculture in the form of sugar a revolution? Using either William Clarks Ten Views prints and/or the Barbados statistic documents, describe some of the major changes which occurred during this Sugar Revolution?
Secondary Sources:
Richard S. Dunn, Sugar and Slaves: The Rise of the Planter Class in the English West Indies, 1624-1713 (1972)
B. W. Higman, “The Sugar Revolution,” The Economic History Review 53 (2000): 213-236
Eric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery (1944)
Question #4:
With the emergence of the first independent black nation in the Caribbean basin, the Haitian Revolution produced several official documents that stunned the Atlantic world. In this question you will consider how these documents relate to each other. In thinking about how these documents are connected, compare and contrast one of the two sets of documents:
1. Toussaints Constitution of 1801 and Haitian Constitution of 1805
2. The Haitian Declaration of Independence and Dessaliness Proclamation of 1804
What are the significant differences and similarities between them? What changed between the time of their production? What made them significant in the Atlantic and Caribbean world?
