History Grundkurs Course Review

Grundkurs Outline: The Rise of the Modern State

The Assignment: Grundkurs Review Project
Semester One:

Semester Two:

Semester Three:

Semester Four:

Black Slave Owners?

Really?

Goes to show, it’s almost always even more complex and nuanced than we might imagine.

In 1830, the year most carefully studied by Carter G. Woodson, about 13.7 percent (319,599) of the black population was free. Of these, 3,776 free Negroes owned 12,907 slaves, out of a total of 2,009,043 slaves owned in the entire United States, so the numbers of slaves owned by black people over all was quite small by comparison with the number owned by white people. In his essay, ” ‘The Known World’ of Free Black Slaveholders,” Thomas J.

Pressly, using Woodson’s statistics, calculated that 54 (or about 1 percent) of these black slave owners in 1830 owned between 20 and 84 slaves; 172 (about 4 percent) owned between 10 to 19 slaves; and 3,550 (about 94 percent) each owned between 1 and 9 slaves. Crucially, 42 percent owned just one slave…

It is reasonable to assume that the 42 percent of the free black slave owners who owned just one slave probably owned a family member to protect that person, as did many of the other black slave owners who owned only slightly larger numbers of slaves…
Moreover, Woodson explains, “Benevolent Negroes often purchased slaves to make their lot easier by granting them their freedom for a nominal sum, or by permitting them to work it out on liberal terms.” In other words, these black slave-owners, the clear majority, cleverly used the system of slavery to protect their loved ones. That’s the good news.

…But not all did, and that is the bad news.

Black Slave Owners?

Economist Special Report on Mexico, 2006

You were assigned to read and respond to the introduction AND one of the following articles from the Economist Special Report on Mexico:

  • Pregnant pause: The old political model has died; a new one has yet to be born
  • Mexico’s mezzogiorno: What is needed to bridge the gaping north-south divide
  • Plodding on: Economic stability is all very well, but where’s the growth?
  • Monopoly money: Competition is not Mexico’s strongest point
  • The joy of informality: Working in the official economy has its drawbacks

The response questions are here.

So all of you will answer questions 1-6 after which you will only respond to the questions which pertain to the article assigned to you.

Also, so that we can refer to the piece in our conversation, please print out the one article assigned to you (just a couple pages).