Slavery and Emancipation in the Colonial Archives: British Officials, Slave-Owners, and Slaves in the Protectorate of the Gambia (1890-1936)

Abstract

L'histoire de l'émancipation des esclaves dans la Gambie coloniale met en avant, une fois encore, l'ambiguïté des politiques coloniales liées à la libération des esclaves et aux compensations offertes. D'une part, la légis-lation coloniale rendait illégale la traite des esclaves, encore prospère le long de la rivière Gambie, dans les dernières décennies du 19ème siècle. D'autre part, le gouvernement tolérait le maintien de l'esclavage à l'intérieur de communautés locales, ne disposant pas des moyens matériels et militaires, peut-être même aussi de la volonté d'introduire des changements substantiels. Les esclaves ont dû se battre pour leur liberté. Cet article illustre deux épisodes au cours desquels les esclaves ont montré leur capacité à tirer le plus grand profit des fractures du pouvoir, créées par la situation coloniale au niveau local. Loin d'être des évènements isolés dans l'histoire de la Gambie, les deux témoignent d'une résistance active, organisée par les esclaves, malgré une législation favorable au maintien de la hiérarchie locale, même si leur action était conçue de manière à ne pas offusquer la rhétorique humanitaire du pouvoir colonial.

Post-Slavery Refractions: Subjectivity and Slave Descent in a Gambian Life Story

“…Since the late nineteenth century, the arrival of labour migrants such as Ansumana had made the control of slave labour less fundamental to the rural economy, and emancipation was under way even before the British established a protectorate in the Upper River in 1901 (Weil 1984). After a period of partial abolition and hesitant policy implementation, the colonial rulers abolished all forms of slavery in 1930, leaving slaves nevertheless to negotiate the terms of their social emancipation with their former masters (Bellagamba 2005). The speed and manner of emancipation varied, depending on the specific trajectory and conditions in which slaves found themselves.…”

“…In particular, it has been shown that slave descendants often share, whilst failing to fully abide by, dominant codes of honour and shame (Soninke: yaagu ) based on both pure origins and virtuous comportment. They thus figure variously as inferior, dependent and immature persons (Pollet and Winter 1971: 227, 255–59; Bellagamba 2005: 13; Klein 2005; 2009: 35) 1 . This article endorses and pushes this line of inquiry further by describing not only the norms and ideals of respectability that are sustained by post-slavery, but also where and how slave descent applies in the process of pursuing, inhabiting and narrating dignified selfhood in everyday life.…”

Diaspora without Homeland: Slave Descendants and the Cultural Politics of Ancestry in the Upper Gambia River Valley

“…The internal trade in slaves was effectively brought to an end by the First World War, and all forms of slavery were finally abolished in 1930 (Bellagamba, 2005). Abolition was, however, confined to the legal aspects of slavery, and did not address the social and economic ones.…”

The Concept of Honour and the Persistence of Servility in the Western Soudan

“…Former slaves often paid assaka to their former masters and they could not make the pilgrimage to Mecca without buying their freedom under traditional law. Buying a freedom previously given by the colonial state was called among the Gambian Mandinka "paying for his/her neck" (Bellagamba 2005). The most difficult problem I faced was reconciling my materialist assumptions about historical change and the persistence of institutions that confirmed the social hegemony of the former masters.…”

“…Pulaaku is one of several such codes found in the western Soudan. Bazin (1975) speaks of Bambara horonya, Bellagamba (2005) of horomaa among the Gambia Mandinka. These codes demand that noble be brave 10.…”