Week 4: Guardians, Slaves, and Changing Dynamics – Reading

In Stephanie Smallwood’s article “African Guardians, European Slave Ships and the Changing Dynamics,” she makes her argument clear that supremacy of the sea and the slave trade was not going to be easy to maintain over a long time period. After reading and analyzing her article, I found that the control of slaves and of the Atlantic Ocean are the two most important pillars in order to claim supremacy.

First, she states that supremacy of the Atlantic Ocean was not going to last because slaves forced to the slave trade will find ways to rebel against the trade. Slaves will find their chance to rebel before their capture and their eventual capture. The slaves would find ways to cause chaos on the ship, so individuals responsible for the trade had to make sure that they had chains and weaponry to prevent “an actual outbreak of [slave] revolt” (Smallwood, 679). And secondly, she mentions that supremacy of the Atlantic Ocean will not last if a group or company cannot keep complete control of the sea, in a form of a monopoly. Three different nations were able to hold control of the sea during the 15th till the 18th century; the Portuguese had complete control of the Atlantic Ocean during the 15th and 16th centuries while the English and the Dutch were able to take away the Portuguese’s control of the ocean during the 17th and 18th centuries.

While I agree with Smallwood’s argument that supremacy of the sea and of the slave trade was not going to be easy in the long term, I do believe that there are many more pillars that can be made in order to maintain supremacy. While I believe that her argument lacks in-depth explanations, she does make a good solid argument point.

Smallwood, Stephanie. “African Guardians, European Slave Ships and the Changing Dynamics of Power in the Early Modern Atlantic,” The William and Mary Quarterly, 64, No. 4, (Oct. 2007): 679-716.