“African forms of slavery were less exploitative than European or Islamic forms of slavery.” Evaluate this claim by discussing at least three examples from our readings.

 Instructions:

Answer two of the following three essay questions using your notes from our course readings and inclass discussions. Each essay should be 500-750 words in length. When composing your short essays, be sure to support your argument by using specific examples from our readings/discussions. You are welcome to quote from the texts, but be careful to avoid lengthy and/or unnecessary quotations. Rather, summarize key ideas and concepts in your own words. As a rule of thumb, be sure to add a citation whenever you are using someone else’s ideas other than your own. For this midterm, citations should contain the author’s last name and page number within a pair of parentheses. For example: “Iris Berger argued that XXXXX (Berger, p. 13).” Deadline: The midterm is due on March 15 by 5:00 pm. Please upload your midterm to the “Assignments” page on NYU Classes as a Word document or PDF, or by typing it directly into the text box on the assignment page. Do not upload a link to a Google Doc /document stored in Google Drive or submit your midterms via a NYU Classes message.

Question 1: Writing in 1960, a prominent scholar of African politics described the Sahara Desert as “an ocean of sand and isolation” which was responsible for the historical “isolation” of Sub-Saharan Africa from contact with the rest of the world. From our class readings and discussions, does viewing Africa below the Sahara as a vast region marginalized from the rest of the world seem like a useful way of understanding Africa’s history? Using examples from the readings, discuss why or why not.

Question 2: “African forms of slavery were less exploitative than European or Islamic forms of slavery.” Evaluate this claim by discussing at least three examples from our readings.

Question 3: We tend to think of slavery as something imposed upon Africans by the arrival of Europeans. But historical research has shown that the actions of Africans themselves influenced the way that the slave trade took shape. Using examples from our readings, discuss three ways that African individuals or communities facilitated, limited, or otherwise gave shape to the development of the Atlantic, Indian Ocean, or trans-Saharan slave trades.