Trans Atlantic Slave Trade
March 7, 2006
Trans Atlantic Slave Trade
Slavery originated from Africa "after the Bantu migrations spread agricultural to all parts of the continent." Africans would buy slaves to enlarge their families and have more power. Also, they would buy slaves in order to sell them to make a profit. It then spread out from Africa to Portugal and was said, "it is estimated that during the four and a half centuries of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, Portugal was responsible for transporting over 4.5 million Africans (roughly 40% of the total)." There was one purpose of slaves and that was work, at little or no cost. Nobody wanted to pay others when there really was not that much money in the economy to begin with. The Europeans wanted to expand their lands in the new world, but in order to do this they needed to have a "work force" instilled over there in order to be able to have crops and such to trade to build the economy. No European wanted to travel over to the New World in order to work, so to fulfill tasks, such as the farming in order to have items to trade, they had to get acquire help. The Europeans looked to the Africans to work on big plantations. The only way that Europeans could obtain "help" with the farm work and housework at no cost, was to force others to do it, hence slavery. Since African Americans looked different from the other cultures, they felt as if they were better than them and felt that the different colored skin and the different type of hair had somehow affected the brains of the African Americans. The Europeans decided to force labor upon the African Americans because they were superior workers. They "had experience of agriculture and keeping cattle and they were used to a tropical climate [and] resistant to tropical diseases."
In Africa, the societies were tremendously affected. Africa, like in many other societies, has had roles assigned to the men and women. For example,...
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