Colloquium "After the slave trades" in memory of Patrick Harries

On next Tuesday 14th and Wednesday 15th November, the Nantes Institute for Advanced Study will host :

After the slave trades.

Reflecting on forms of dependency and slavery

(Africa – America – Europe, 18th-20th centuries)

Colloquium in memory of Patrick Harries
Institute of Advanced Studies – Nantes, 14-15 November 2017

A fundamental ambiguity affected the debates on slavery and labour after the mid-18th century. The successive abolition of the African slave trade, the prohibitions on slavery and the pursuit of transoceanic migration in the Atlantic and Indian oceans were accompanied by the development of new categories of “free” workers, but also by the affirmation of new forms of dependency and “unfree” labour between the 18th and 20th centuries. Do these realities build on a long history of colonial relations between Europe and its colonies, or are we witnessing the emergence of new forms of slavery and dependency? This colloquium will aim to examine the forms of dependency, slavery and “unfree” labour which are unfolding, or resurfacing, in Africa, the Americas and Europe, in societies which have experienced and perpetrated slavery on a long-term basis. The use of slavery made it possible until a relatively late period to continue supplying colonial and metropolitan economies in manpower as if to ensure a form of stability in these societies. But besides the question of historical disruptions and continuities, it seems to us important to include the long history of forced transfers of men and women between various parts of the African continent towards Europe and the Americas in the new representations and new discourses which appeared after the abolition of the slave trades. New discourses relating to such topics as the relationship to work and representations of work, the status of “new” workers (domestic staff, servants, apprentices, employees, indentured laborers, freed slaves, etc.), or "race" as a biological construction but also, and perhaps even more so, as a social construction which predetermines individual status, and social, economic and legal relations between masters/employers/recruiters and apprentices/employees/indentured laborers… The aim is to reflect upon actual slavery practices, or practices akin to slavery, from an economic, legal or social perspective, while at the same time examining the individual or collective relationship to labour and the changing nature of labour in post-abolitionist economies. Five major issues will constitute the focal point of these two days:

1 - Forced labour/free labour: with slave trade prohibitions and the abolition of slavery, labour became free in theory, but what about in reality? What professions and salaries can former slaves, their descendants or newcomers to the African continent aspire to? How were dependencies between “employers” and “employees” (re)created and/or maintained?

2 - The legal forms which accompanied the suppression of the slave trade and slavery: what tools were used by societies/states to regulate both work and workers? What was the impact of African or Caribbean experiences on abolitionist legislation? How could stakeholders close to the field act to encourage progress in labour law? The analysis of labour contracts and the creation of labour legislation will be at the core of this approach.

3 - Social and cultural practices: beyond their status as workers, what is the room for manoeuvre for populations of slave origin? How can they integrate societies? Marriages, unions and intimate relationships (choice of spouse, practice of illegitimacy or not, forms of ceremonies) or cultural practices will be analysed to establish exactly how “race” and the status of “forced labourer” influence trajectories.

4 - Labour migration: were migratory flows of free and unfree workers crossing the Atlantic and the Indian ocean after 1761, the year of the first abolition of the African slave trade by Portugal, a continuation of slave trade flows of captive Africans? Were the stakeholders the same? Are conditions experienced by migrants comparable?

5 - Changes in labour discourses after the abolitions: discourses were not homogeneous and did not remain set in stone. How has the changing nature of labour and its representations influenced the development of African, American and European economies and societies? How can we link the value of the emancipation of labour and the instrument of slavery which it remains?

These ideas are not meant to be exhaustive and we shall consider with great interest any suggestions concerning other geographical or chronological contexts and more theoretical aspects which could widen and enhance the cross-disciplinary debate.

Organized at the Institute of Advanced Studies Nantes and part of a cycle of scholarly activities scheduled in the STARACO (STAtus, RAce and COlour in the Atlantic) and PRALT (PRActices of ALTerity) research programs, this colloquium is a tribute to the memory of Patrick Harries. A historian specialising in labour, slavery and forms of dependency in Africa, Patrick Harries died suddenly in 2016. He had been working for many years on slaves and slave descendants from Mozambique to Cape Town and, in parallel, on the nature of the slave trade in the Indian ocean on which he was one of the leading specialists.

Coordination

António DE ALMEIDA MENDES (Université de Nantes, STARACO, CIRESC, fellow at IAS-Nantes)
Céline FLORY (Mondes Américains-CERMA, CIRESC, CNRS)
Aanor LE MOUËL (Université de Nantes, STARACO)
Aspasia NANAKI (IAS-Nantes)
Violaine TISSEAU (IMAF, CNRS)

Organisation AND collaboration

PRALT (PRActices of ALTerity): multi-annual research program involving Casa de Velázquez (Madrid), Château des Ducs de Bretagne (Nantes), Institute Of Advanced Studies (Nantes) and Université de Nantes.
STARACO (STAtus, RAce and COlours in the Atlantic): research program financed by the Pays de la Loire region, Nantes (www.staraco.org)
UMR 8168- Mondes Américains
IMAF: Institute of African Worlds
CIRESC: Centre International de Recherches sur les Esclavages
IDA: Institut des Amériques

PROVISIONAL PROGRAM

Tuesday, 14th November 2017

2.00 pm: Welcome by Samuel JUBÉ (director of IAS-Nantes)
Testimonials from Fellows of IAS-Nantes in memory of Patrick HARRIES

2.30 pm: Presentation of the PRALT program by Nicolas MORALES (Casa de Velázquez) and Krystel GUALDÉ (Château des ducs de Bretagne)

2.35 pm: introduction to the colloquium by António DE ALMEIDA MENDES (Université de Nantes, STARACO/IAS-Nantes)

2.50-5.00 pm: Samuel SANCHEZ (Université de Paris I, IMAF),
Myriam COTTIAS (CIRESC-CNRS), ‘Political hermaphroditism’: experiences of dependency and conflicts of legitimacy in “patronés” and the “de facto free” in the French West Indies in the 19^th century

Alexander KEESE (Université de Genève), Compulsory work – but without compulsion?The invention of communal work as a colonial instrument and ideological element of postcolonial societies in Ghana and sub-Saharan Africa, 1918-2017

Romain TIQUET (Université de Genève), Forced labour in West Africa: a bygone research subject?

Wednesday, 15th November 2017

9.30am-12 pm: Isabelle SURUN (Université de Lille III, IRHIS),
Nigel PENN (University of Cape Town, former fellow at IAS-Nantes), The Slave Trade – Its Abolition and Aftermath at the Cape of Good Hope, 1807-1838

Alessandro STANZIANI (EHESS), The Welfare state and the colonial world, 1880-1914. The casa of the French Equatorial Africa

Dominique VIDAL (Université Paris Diderot, URMIS), What does it mean to describe as slaves the Bolivian immigrants working in the garment industry in São Paulo?

2.00-5.00 pm: Céline LABRUNE-BADIANE (Université de Paris VII, fellow at IAS-Nantes)

Jean-Pierre Le CROM (CNRS, Université de Nantes) Chinese indentured labourers on the Congo-Ocean railway (1929-1933). Revisiting a dismal failure.

Henrique ESPADA LIMA (Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Former Fellow at IAS-Nantes), A History of a Different Future: The end of slavery and slaves’ expectations of rights in Brazil (1870s and 1880s)

Jean HEBRARD (EHESS and Johns Hopkins University), Slavery and dependency in transitional slave societies: the case of Santo Domingo (Dominican Republic) at the time of the Haitian Revolution

Virginie CHAILLOU (Université de Nantes, Labex EHNE), Legal and social status of African indentured labourers in post-abolitionist Réunion society

Conclusions: Céline FLORY (Mondes Américains-CERMA, CNRS) and Violaine TISSEAU (IMAF, CNRS)

To attend the colloquium, please, fill up the form below.

IMAF : Institut des Mondes Africains
CIRESC : Centre International de Recherches sur les Esclavages
IDA : Institut des Amériques