Slavery and Servitude in the U.S.

Paper Summary:

The paper discusses the evolution of the indentured servant, as well as the means through which servitude was transformed into slavery, in order to highlight the general differences that appeared between black and white servants. The paper shows how, in the beginning, there was no difference between the whites and the blacks that were engaged in in indentured work. The paper then explains why slave trading became widely accepted and why black slaves were preferred over white ones.
The paper highlights how it was merely external forces that instilled the idea of racial discrimination, of racial inferiority and of the exploitation of human beings for more than two centuries.

From the Paper:

"The issue of slavery and servitude represented an important moment in the history of the United States. It also marked the direction the history of civil rights would eventually follow in the 20th century. There were different methods of servitude. Aside from the traditional means of slavery which included forced labor, indentured labor was a special category of labor which was considered, from a moral point of view to be superior to actual slavery. The evolution of the indentured service as well as the means through which servitude was transformed in slavery are important for pointing out the general differences that appeared between the black and the white servants."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Africans in America. (n.d.) "From Indentured Servitude to Racial Slavery". The Terrible Transformation. Retrieved 5 March 2008, from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part1/1narr3.html
• Bryant, Linda Allen. (2000) Slavery and Miscegenation in America. Retrieved 5 March 2008, from http://www.westfordlegacy.com/History/slavedoc.html
• Galenson, David W. (1984). T"he Rise and Fall of Indentured Servitude in the Americas: An Economic Analysis". The Journal of Economic History, Vol. 44, No. 1. pp. 1-26.
• Jenkins, P. (1997). A history of the United States. New York: Palgrave.
• Patterson, Orlando. (2007) "The Root of the Problem". Time. Retrieved 5 March 2008, from http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1615164,00.html?imw=Y

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