The Transatlantic Slave Trade

The Atlantic Slave Trade was the most notable consequence of European explorations along the coast of Africa in the 1400s. During the age of European maritime and commercial expansion, large areas of Africa were brought into the orbit of the burgeoning world economy and were influenced by the transformation taking place. The slave trade, as devastating as it was for the African population, changed the course of history and had an indirect effect on societies as far as China. Thus, this integration of the African continent in the global network of change had a profound impact on the whole world.

At first, the scope of the slave trade was insignificant on the global scale. When the Portugese estabilished their first factories along the west African coast, what they did was provide local African rulers with slaves brought from other streches of the coast. In return, the Portugese received ivory, pepper, animal skins, and gold. But the Portugese quickly realized that they could successfully exploit the institution of slavery, especially because the Iberian peninsula had been maintaining a consistent amount of slaves ever since the Muslims estabilished their presence there in the 700s. The first slaves brought directly to Portugal from Africa arrived in 1441, after which slaves became a common trade item. An additional impetus was provided when the Portugese and the Spanish began to develop sugar plantations on the Atlantic islands of Madeira and the Canaries. But what most severely increased the scope of the slave trade and added the adjective 'transatlantic' was the development of the American plantation colonies, especially Brazil, on the other side of the world. The voyages of Columbus and the successive defeat of the Aztecs and Inca populations by Cortez and Pizarro, respectively, enabled the Iberians to monopolize Latin America and assert themselves as the prime authority there. Because the remaining indigenous population had no immunity to the diseases which the Europeans brought along with them, they died out quickly, thus leaving the conquerors with no other alternative but to turn to Africa and extract their labor force from this vibrant continent.

An eyewitness to the unloading of slaves in Portugal in 1444 wrote,

“But what heart could be so hard as not to be pierced with piteous feelings to see that company? For some kept their heads low and their faces bathed in tears, looking one upon another; others stood groaning very dolorously, looking up to the height of heaven, fixing their eyes upon it, crying out loudly, as if asking help of the Father of Nature.“

It is difficult to imagine the Africans' plight during the era of the slave trade. Even though the transatlantic slave trade was centered around men, because they were considered to be physically more apt to work the plantations, this does nothing to alleviate the effect the trade had on African society. Families were torn apart. Once a man had been enslaved, there was almost no hope that he would see his family again. What's more, the mortality rate on the ships was from 10 to 20 percent, which meant that one fourth of the slaves never even made it to the New World. The ones who managed to survive the Middle Passage, as the trip from Africa to the Americas was called, were shamelessly exploited and often died within the first couple of months from their arrival.

In the Americas, African slaves had to adapt and to incorporate other Africans' ideas and customs into their own lives. The ways and customs of the masters were also imposed. Thus, what emerged as an unique Afro-American culture reflected specific African roots adapted to a new reality. Religion, for example, reflected continuity and adaptation. African religous ideas and practices did not die out. In the English islands, these practices were collectively termed obeah, and the men and women knowledgeable in them were held in high esteem within the community. In Brazil and Haiti, fully developed versions of African religions flourished and continue today, despite attempts to suppress them.

The end of the Atlantic slave trade and the abolition of slavery in the Atlantic world resulted from economic, political, and religious reasons. These reasons, which were manifestations of the Enlightment, the age of revolution, and Christian revivalism, were external to Africa, but once again they determined the pace and nature of change within this continent. Nonetheless, the transatlantic slave trade remains to be one of the most significant historical occurences which marked a whole era.

An Encounter

Septimus looked serene; his eyes were watery, and his heart slippery. His troubled mind did not seem all too cooperative with his unblemished inner self, and he just sat there, evoking a feeling of both awe and pity in the passer-bys, with his halo of floating despair and bits and pieces of clumsy silence above his head. He felt as if he had been yelling for hours, yet knew that he had not uttered a word for the past couple of days. Or maybe he had yelled, but the sound frequency of his voice was unrecognizable to his fellow humans. Was he even human? Certainly, the halo didn’t make him an angel; the halo doesn’t make the angel, Septimus thought. Besides, angels have golden halos, and his was sort of dirty blonde, murky, and it had an unsavory texture and an inappropriate weight- it was heavy, it was one heavy halo to own. Incidentally, it was also an invisible halo, because no one except he could see it; thus, it only had Septimus to victimize. He looked up. Oh, how the clouds stumbled in and assembled stupidly in the sky. Great, obese clouds. Dark and plump. Bumping into each other. Apologizing. Moving on and finding room.
“What is that above your head?”
Septimus turned. He was used to strangers talking to him, but never had someone taken notice of his notorious halo.
“Above my head?”
The woman looked confused. She looked around inquiringly, moving her eyes at a pace Septimus found hard to follow. She was wearing a long pajama, had huge eyes, enormous eye bags, not much of a hairstyle, but she was beautiful. And beautifully confused. She looked as if she had just miscalculated something very important; a miscalculation that could bring about the end of the world.
“The grass,” she whispered “it’s green.”
Septimus considered the possibility of her being an escapee from the asylum Dr.Bradshaw wanted him sent to.
“Is this Antarctica?”
“Regent’s Park.”
“Washington?”
“London.”
“London!?” she screamed. “How did I end up in London? Why are you intruding upon my hallucination?”
“Hallucination?”
“I was supposed to be sent to Antarctica. My travel agent, he promised.”
The woman seemed deeply disturbed by the fact that she had not, after all, landed on Antarctica. Septimus had never met such a woman before, and, although a little intimidated, decided to comfort her.
“Don’t worry Miss. London is an exciting place. I am sure you will have more fun here than you would on Antarctica,” Septimus continued, doubting his own words. “What’s so special about Antarctica anyway?”
“Everything is white there,” the woman said, “and there are no people, only snow. And Eskimos. And I can build an entire city just the way I want it to be. And,” she continued fervently, shaking from excitement, “I can have a baby there. I will be all by myself. Wonderfully alone.”
Septimus’s eyes widened; his halo felt heavy.
“May I come, too?”
“Ahem. You will have to arrange that with my travel agent. But I am quite sure you may join me,” she smiled her vague smile.
Septimus smiled as well. Two people in Regent’s Park, a man sitting down and a woman standing next to him, kept smiling at each other, finding each other, groping for recognition. There was something familiar about the man, she thought, and felt how he noticed there was something familiar about her as well.
“I will now sit beside you,” the woman said, very matter-of-factly. Such an awkward woman. Such a lonely heart.
“Harper Pitt.”
“Septimus Warren Smith.”
A handshake. Silence.
“I have emotional problems,” Harper broke the silence, which was not in the least awkward. “Actually, my husband thinks I have emotional problems. I don’t think I have any problems.”
“My wife thinks I am not sane,” Septimus joined her. “She takes me to this doctor, and he keeps telling her to send me away.”
“Why don’t you leave your wife?”
“Why don’t you leave your husband?”
“My husband is a homosexual.”
“My wife is Italian.”
Silence.
“I want one of those things over my head. It’d make me look special, so heavenly. Like a martyr.”
“Martyrs suffer on behalf of their causes,” Septimus said thoughtfully.
“What’s your cause?” she asked.
“Preserving,” answered Septimus. “What’s yours?”
“Searching,” she answered, smiling again. There was something so splendid about the way in which the woman formulated her responses, but at the same time another feeling would not let you admire it.
“What do you say that we continue our quests on Antarctica?” Harper stood up, “I think you might have a better chance at preserving there, don’t you think?”
“And you would have a broader searching area,” he added. “Besides, it’s easier to find something if everything else is white, isn’t it?”
“Agreed.”
Two people, holding hands, walked through Regent’s park in London, and headed south. They were two people who, although they had never met before, recognized each other and decided to embark on a journey. As the sun set and the light left London, two lone owners of two lonely hearts walked south, their haloes illuminating their path, making their way to Antarctica.

Common Spelling Mistakes, The Short Guide to

1. There is a silent c in the middle of ABSCESS that's easy to forget.
2. If you spell ADDRESS wrongly, you probably miss out one d. Remember to double the d and the s.
3. People sometimes write ADVISE with an s where they ought to write ADVICE with a c. The verb is advise and the noun is advice.
4. The biggest problem with spelling AGGRAVATE is not how many gs there are at the beginning, but that there is an a (not an e) in the middle.
5. Almost one in every hundred references to the ANTARCTIC is written without its first c as Antartic.
6. You might expect a word that sounds like BROCCOLI to have two ls at the end, but it has only one because it comes from Italian and ends with an i.
7. A lot of verbs ending in et have two ts when you add an ending like -ing, but BUDGET is not one of them: BUDGETING and BUDGETED have a single t.
8. CINNAMON is a tricky word to spell.
9. The problem in deciding how to spell COMMEMORATE seems to be how many ms it should have. People often decide on four. In fact, it should have only three, as in COMMEMORATION.
10. The words DEPENDANT and DEPENDENT are easy to confuse. The first, ending in -ant, is a noun meaning a person who is dependent (adjective ending in -ent) on someone else.
11. The words DESICCATE has two cs because it comes from the Latin word siccus, which means "dry".
12. Remember, it's DISAPPOINTED, not DISSAPOINTED.
13. It may surprise you that it's the vowels, not the consonants that are a problem when people try to spell EXHILARATE or EXHILARATION. They often make the mistake of writing an e instead of an a in the middle.
14. Lots of nouns in the English language end with -tion, but EXTENSION and EXPANSION do not.
15. UNFORESEEN is often misspelled as UNFORSEEN.
16. People get confused about the number of fs and ts in GRAFFITI. The correct spelling has two fs and only one t.
17. The silent h in HAEMORRHAGE is often missed.
18. The verb INOCULATE has only one n and one c.
19. LIGHTNING and LIGHTENING cannot be used interchangeably.
20. There are two ns to remember in the middle of MAYONNAISE - possibly a good reason for the increasing use of the abbreviation "mayo'.
21. If you spell MILLENNIUM with only one n, you are not alone.
22. The pronunciation of MINUSCULE often leads people to substitute the first u with an i.
23. Some people get carried away with doubling ss and write OBSSESSION instead of OBSESSION.
24. Remember, there is no o between the n and the u in PRONUNCIATION.
25. The correct spelling of QUESTIONNAIRE has two ns.
26. There is a silent c in RESUSCITATE; it comes after the second s, not the first one.
27. The words STATIONARY and STATIONERY are completely different in meaning and should not be confused.
28. Although there is a word "cede", the word SUPERSEDE must have an s in the middle.
29. USUALLY has a double l.
30. The pronunciation of WEIRD possibly leads people to spell it with the vowels the wrong way round.