American Slavery Chapter Summary

The book, “American Slavery: 1619-1877” written by Peter Kolchin and published first in 1993 and then published with revisions in 2003, takes an in depth look at American slavery throughout the country’s early history, from the pre-Revolutionary War period to the post-Civil War period. The first chapter deals with the origins of slavery within the United States. It discusses the introduction of slavery to the nation even before it was officially a nation. The colonies in the United States were agricultural and the cultivation of crops required labor. When forced labor began, the colonists experimented with other groups of people, both Native American Indians and Europeans, as slaves before settling on the imported Africans as their main source of forced labor. It was not until the 1680s that Africans began to be exploited as slaves. Due to the growing population within the colonies, a greater number of slaves and indentured …show more content…
A decrease in the supply of European indentured servants, however, called for a new source. This new source would be African men and women slaves, who were growing in availability due to institutions such as the African Slave Trade. The importation of African slaves had major implications for the United States socially as well as politically, both at the time and throughout the rest of history. Slavery changed the social dynamic and population of the United States and was the basis of the economic system in the South. The second chapter explores slavery and the transition from a mostly African-born slave to population, to a mostly American-born population, during the colonial period (late 1600s until about 1770). At the beginning of this time period, most slaves were imported and not born on American soil. After their forced immigration, these slaves underwent a process called ‘seasoning,’ or training, where they were “broken in” and made to realize that slavery would be their identity for the rest of their lives. As time went on,