American History. The Trans-Atlantic Slave trade

Think piece #1 I choose to answer the second topic. the dehumanizing forces of the transatlantic slave trade The Trans-Atlantic Slave trade was considered the most abominable and cruel force of slavery, during the trade, the way of obtaining the slave is dehumanizing, if we were to conclude the dehumanizing force in only one word, it would be: the minimum food, clothing, and shelter was given to those slaves who survived the Middle-Passage, and the maximum amount of work was expected of them. The first challenge was on their homeland, they were towed into a forest where no one can see them, then people who work for the capitalist beat the person to faint, and then they were chained together and â€Å"escorted† to the small boat which will send them to the slave boat. After that, when they were on boat, they were put on the lower cabin like cargos, there was almost no room to breathe or take a turn. And the food is horrible as well, the slaves can only get food once or at most twice a day, and the food is at most one-spoon full and the taste is awful. Slaves also have no bowls or spoons to eat; they ate with their bare dirty hands. What is more horrible is that ships often run out of food or sometimes there is infectious disease on board, then the slaves who is extra will be thrown into the sea with a bag of heavy rock tied in the beginning. Thus the survival rate during the transportation is extremely low; the number is only 13% or so. The first reason why that method is employed is that slaves were better used to the tropical weather than the capitalist, what is more, their physical building is tough and the number of slaves is much more than the solders on the ship. If they were treated like a human, whom they can get sufficient food and shelter, there might be a rebellion which may put those capitalist into peculiar situation. And at second, the slaves were considered property instead of human in the mind of those capitalists, thus they will not be treated like human. Despite all those horrible conditions and treatments, black people formed a strong culture tie between one and another to keep their rebellion force. The culture they formed is fusion of their own cultures with that of the white colonists, and the culture varies from country to country, region to region across the Americas. Although the slaves were captured from the same kingdoms, for instance, Louisiana is vastly different from that in Haiti or in Brazil. The differences were due to the differing conditions of slavery and the different input from whites in those places.