1. Slavery in the New World
Q: Why did slavery target Africans in the new world?
A: Economics
Q: What are the lasting effects of this?
A: Today’s continuing Racism (?)

2. Slavery: a universal human institution
Slavery existed in almost all human cultures
Prehistoric
Ancient Greece and Rome
New World (Aztecs and Incas)
Amerindian
African
Middle East
BUT

3. In these other cultures, slavery was almost always a product of “bad luck”. “Anyone” could become a slave.
You could be
Sold into slavery by poor relatives
Captured in war
Sentenced for a crime
As payment for debts
Born into slavery
BUT

4. In the New World, only Africans could be slaves. Why?
Originally, Native people and European indentured servants were also “slaves”.
Eventually, only Africans were slaves. Why?
There was an economic advantage for slave owners to keep African Americans; cheap labour increased personal wealth

5. BUT The JUSTIFICATIONS for this followed the PRACTICE.
In initial contacts between Europeans and Africans, there is no hint of the racism of later centuries.
African kingdoms and cultures are praised by European explorers
It is only later, when slavery is under attack that, as a justification for keeping them as slaves, negative opinions and theories about Africans are developed

6. The Slave Trade
Developed to feed the need for cheap labour on New World plantations
Part of a huge
economic system.
Why hire workers,
when you
could buy them?

7. So, more and more Africans were captured and sent to America where they were packed into inhumane conditions along the way

9. Slavery disputes eventually culminated in the DRED SCOTT case (1857), when the Supreme Court of the US said “no AFRICAN could ever be a citizen.”
Africans eventually were seen as simple, weak, unintelligent, even not human, to justify their status as slaves: These opinions were developed after Africans were already slaves.
“Science” was also misused to show Africans were only fit to be slaves.

10. The Result in American Society
Even after slaves were freed at the end of the civil war (1865), many Americans kept the negative views of African Americans
In particular, poor whites held onto these ideas because it gave them an advantage over African Americans
Racism made the poorest, most ignorant white “better” than any African American
Discrimination and segregation of African Americans continued well into the 20th century which eventually led to the civil rights movement

11. The Novel- To Kill a Mockingbird
Racism and discrimination are dominant topics in the novel as it is set in the 1930’s, in the deep south, where racist ideologies were still deeply rooted.
While the African Americans presented in the novel are ‘free’, the novel highlights the difference between freedom and equality.
Harper Lee explores controversial topics and includes offensive terms throughout her story, but does so in a such a graceful and compassionate manner that her story has earned universal praise.