The Oxford Encyclopedia of Slavery, the Slave Trade, and the Diaspora in African History

by Klein, Martin

• ISBN13: 9780190077631
• ISBN10: 0190077638
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2026-05-20
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• More Book Details
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Summary

Both colonial and early nationalist writers of African history tried to minimize the importance of the slave trade in the study of Africa's past and present. Increasingly, however, scholars have recognized the significance of the institution for properly understanding African history, both within the continent and throughout the Diaspora. Much of Africa entered into relations with the rest of the world as a producer of coerced labor. The Nile Valley and the coast of Northeast Africa were sources of slaves for ancient Egypt, and by the colonial period, dating from the 15th to the 19th centuries, the slave trade had become a major activity, shaping political, economic, and social structures. In the 21st century, Africa is a focal point for international debates regarding modern versions of slavery.

The Oxford Encyclopedia of Slavery, the Slave Trade, and the Diaspora in African History is the first reference work of its kind to explore this history: a comprehensive resource that aims to cover the development, practice, and legacy of the institution of slavery in Africa and the Diaspora, while utilizing the rapidly evolving scholarship in archaeology, ethnography, anthropology, and economics. The contributors utilize the latest research, which has shifted away from the viewpoint of colonizers, traders, and politicians, and has sought to incorporate the voices and experiences of all the people who were involved. Moreover, the writers look beyond the landmark historical and political events to examine the impact on culture and modern global relations, thus pushing the field in new directions, and toward new perspectives and disciplines.

Author Biography

Martin Klein's research has focused on slavery and the slave trade in French West Africa for 50 years, as well as colonial rule and Islam. His most important book is Slavery and Colonial Rule in French West Africa (Cambridge 1998), which was given an honorable mention in the competition for the Herskovits prize of the African Studies Association. He also wrote the Historical Dictionary of Slavery and Abolition (2d edition. Lanham, MD 2014). He has edited Breaking the Chains: Slavery, Bondage and Emancipation in Modern Africa and Asia (Madison, WI 1993), Women and Slavery in Africa (with Clare Robertson, Madison, WI 1983) and Slavery and Colonial Rule in Africa (with Suzanne Miers, London, 1998). He has more recently co-edited with Alice Bellagamba and Sandra E. Greene African Voices on Slavery and the Slave Trade (2 vols., Cambridge, 2013 and 2016), The Bitter Legacy: African Slavery Past and Present (Princeton NJ, 2013) and African Slaves, African Masters: Politics, Memories, Social Life (Trenton, NJ, 2017). Klein has written more than 60 scholarly articles and book chapters, countless book reviews and articles in reference books. He has served as President of the African Studies Association (USA) and the Canadian Association of African Studies and was a recipient of the ASA's Distinguished Africanist Award.

Table of Contents

1. Overviews

Slavery in Africa
Africa and Its Diasporas under Slavery
Agricultural Slavery in Africa
Gender and the Study of Slavery and the Slave Trades in Africa
The Indian Ocean and Africa

2. Ideologies and Policies

Eunuchs
Female Slavery in East and Southeast Africa
Financing the Indian Ocean Slave Trade
Financing the Transatlantic Slave Trade
Ideological and Technological Exchanges in the Early Modern Atlantic
Origins of Slavery in Cabo Verde and São Tomé and Príncipe
Ransoming of Captives and Redemption of Slaves in Sub-Saharan Africa
Ritual Enslavement in West Africa
Secret Knowledge, the Supernatural, and Slavery
Slave and Freed Slave Voices in African Colonial Courts and Liberation Registers
Slavery and State-Building
Slavery in Decentralized Societies
Sugar Plantation Slavery

3. Changing Patterns of Enslavement and Forms of Slavery

Archaeology and the Heritage of Slavery in Eastern Africa
Archaeology of Slavery in Atlantic West Africa, 1450-1900
Donas, Nharas, and Signares: Women Slave Traders in Atlantic Africa
Early Slavery in Bantu and Nilotic-speaking Africa: The Evidence from Historical Linguistics
European Slaves in North Africa and North African Slaves in Europe from the Early Modern Period to the 1820s
Forms of Slavery in the Great Lakes States (East Africa)
Plantation Economy and Slavery in the Mascarene Islands (Indian Ocean)
Slave Trade and Urban Slavery on the Swahili Coast from Medieval Times to Abolition
Slavery and Forced Labor in Madagascar
Slavery and Its Legacy in the Comoro Islands
Slavery and the Making of West African Muslim Empires in the 19th Century
Slavery and the Slave Trade in Ethiopia and Eritrea
Slavery and the Slave Trade in the Sokoto Caliphate
Slavery at the Cape
Slavery in East Central Africa
Slavery in Egypt Under the Mamluks
Slavery in Luanda and Benguela
Slavery in Pharaonic and Hellenistic Egypt
Slavery in Senegambia
Slavery in Somalia
Slavery in the Cities of the Interior of West Africa
Slavery in the Mandara Mountains and Lake Chad Basin
Slavery in the Nile Valley (Egypt and the Sudan)
Slavery in the South African Interior during the 19th Century
Slaving in Bantu-Speaking Regions
Southern Sudanese Systems of Slavery
Urban Slavery along the West African Coast

4. The Slave Trade

African Sailors in the Atlantic World
British Slave Trade in the Atlantic
Central Africa and the Atlantic World
Demography of the Transatlantic Slave Trade
Development of the Early Portuguese Slave Trade and African Responses in Upper Guinea, 1450-1669
Dutch Slave Trade in the Atlantic, 1600-1800
Euro-African Trade Relations and Socioeconomic Development in West Africa, 1450-1900
French Slave Trade
Mechanisms of Enslavement
Middle Passage
19th Century Slave Trade in Eastern Africa
Political Economy of Textiles in the Atlantic Slave Trade
Portuguese Slave Trade
Red Sea Slave Trade
Slave Trade in Indian Ocean Africa
Slave Trade to and from Madagascar
Trans-Atlantic Trade in African Captives, Enslaved Africans in the Americas, and the Industrial Revolution in England
Trans-Saharan Slave Trade

5. The Diaspora

African Slaves and the Persian Gulf
Akan Slavery in Africa and the Atlantic
Aquatic Culture in Atlantic Africa and the Diaspora, 1444-1800
Congo in the Americas and Brazil
Enslaved African Muslims in the Americas
Enslaved Africans in Medieval and Early Modern Iberia
Habshis and Sidis in India
Hausa Diasporas and Slavery in Africa, the Atlantic, and the Muslim World
Igbo Diasporas in Africa and the Atlantic
Rice Cultivation in the History of Slavery
Slave Trades and Diaspora in the Middle East, 700 to 1900 CE
Slavery and the African Diaspora in Spanish America
Slavery in Europe During the Atlantic Slave Trade

6. Religion and Culture

African Music in the Global African Diaspora
African Religion and Healing in the Atlantic Diaspora
African Religions in Brazil
African Religions in Early America and the United States
African Religions in the Maghreb and the Middle East
Image of the Enslaved African in European Art
Literary Representations of Slavery

7. Struggles Against Slavery and the Slave Trade

Freedom Suits in the Ibero-Atlantic World
Kisama Sobados in West Central Africa, 16th and 17th Centuries
Maroon Societies in the Americas
Runaway Communities in Central and South Africa
Slavery and Resistance in West Central Africa
Slave-Ship Insurrections
Zanj Revolt in the Abbasid Caliphate (Iraq)

8. Towards Abolition and Emancipation

British Antislavery and West Africa
Christianity and Abolition in Africa
Global Abolitionist Movements
Islam and Emancipation
Liberated Africans
Routes to Emancipation in East Africa
Routes to Emancipation in Egypt and the Sudan
Routes to Emancipation in Ethiopia
Routes to Emancipation in West Africa
Slavery and Abolitionism in Sierra Leone
Suppression of the Trans-Oceanic Slave Trade
The League of Nations, the International Labour Organization, and Slavery in Africa

9. Aftermath

African Antislavery Activism
Child Slavery in Africa
Cocoa and Child Slavery in West Africa
Combat Games in the Black Atlantic, 17th-19th Centuries
Diaspora Tourism
Digital Sources for the Slave Trade
Forced Labor in Portuguese Africa
Policy and Practice of Forced Labor in the Congo Free State and the Belgian Congo
Post-Slavery
Teaching Slavery and the Slave Trade in Senegal

10. Biographies

Ahmed Bâba at-Timbuktî
'Ali Eisami Gazirmabe
Beatriz Kimpa Vita and the Antonine Movement
Crowther, Samuel Ajayi
Equiano, Olaudah (Gustavus Vasa)
Gaspar, Dona Florinda Josefa
Godinho, André do Couto
Kafuxi Ambari of Kisama
Muhammad 'Ali
Njinga of Ndongo and Matamba
Omar ibn Said
Rabih
Said, Nicholas
Samory
Tippu Tip
Zubair Pasha