Currents of Liberty, Seas of Change: Black Sailors as Subversive Agents of Freedom in the Early Republic

Years after being kidnapped from his native Ibo village as a young boy, Olaudah Equiano vividly recalled his wonder at seeing a European ship for the first time. Although he failed to realize it at the time, that same ship, and the Atlantic currents it navigated, would shortly transport him and millions of his countrymen to lives of slavery on the far shores of a distant continent. In addition to providing a convenient avenue for the initial transport of slaves, water enabled the development of a trade network linking scattered plantations in the Caribbean to centers of trade in North America and Europe where the products of coerced black labor were bought and sold. Even more detrimental to African identity than the systematic exploitation the sea enabled was the insurmountable barrier it presented to the continuance of native customs and identities. Like the slave ships that traversed the ocean currents, however, black culture eventually subverted the rigid order imposed by nature. The presence of black sailors onboard the ships which sustained the colonial Atlantic World created an unparalleled opportunity for strengthening black identity. The seamen assumed the roles of cultural ambassadors, spreading word of the diverse cultures and patterns of life they encountered in their travels to their brothers and sisters in bondage. Capitalizing on the inherent inequality of shipboard life to assert their identities as autonomous equals, black sailors brought hope and, occasionally, freedom to American slaves, all the while undermining the efforts of slaveholders to create a docile labor force

Jenna\u27s Story, Part I

In lieu of an abstract, below is the essay\u27s first paragraph. Jenna slid the needle into her pulsing brachial vein; she always used medical terms she had learned before she dropped out of school, at least the ones that she remembered from that long ago. The prick of the needle and the rush of meth that flooded into her veins when she pushed the plunger down didn\u27t bother her anymore. They were just minor inconveniences. She could feel it melt into her blood and run along the pathways of her body to her brain. Jenna fell back into the green beanbag chair on the floor in front of her mirror. It was taking longer than normal for the life to come back to her when she shot up, but it would come eventually; the waiting is what bothered her