Slavery is a system that has been around before written records existed. But this system has not been uniform in defining what a slave is nor if a slave has any privileges. Epitomising this is the Mesoamerican examples of the Aztecs and the Maya. While the Mayans’ slaves were hereditary, the Aztecs’ were personal, so slaves’ children were free. Moreover slaves could own other slaves in this society, very rare in slavery throughout the world. Consequently it is perhaps naïve to define slavery as a whole as being social death. Social death itself is the condition of one group of people excluded from normal society, encompassing their identity and their lifestyle. Accordingly they are viewed as subhuman and inferior to those who are not slaves.
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However it is more appropriate for this period than the Classical Era. The largest slave trade during this period was that of Sub-Saharan Africa by the Muslims, since during the twelve centuries that it was running, roughly fourteen million Africans were transported. Very explicitly these were viewed as less than human, hence why the men were castrated. Moreover many of the notions that the Europeans used later in the New World have their origins here, like having unbridled sexual lust. Unsurprisingly their descendants are extinct in all but a few areas today, because of the mistreatment they suffered. These slaves exacerbate social death in the extreme, as the word for slave in Arabic, abd, transformed to refer to a black person. Moreover this was the case for other groups of slaves too including the slave trade that emerged in the Black Sea, where treatment was equally harsh. Conversely though, when viewing instances of slavery that appear on the fringes, there once again appear instances which do not fit this model. An illustration of this is Christian Slavery. Once a man became a Christian he was “a(s) bondslave of God”. All his actions were to be in accordance with His will, as opposed to their own. Clearly this does not fit into social death, as this was voluntary by those who followed Christ. In effect this was man choosing slavery over the freedom to act …show more content…
In both the Classical Age and the Modern Era, it was the exception. Only in the Medieval Period was it truly synonymous most of the time because of the great exploits committed by the Muslims. Historians who have tended to categorise slavery as social death like Davis and Patterson, can be correct in the specific cases that they look at because these instances are the typical instances of slavery that we envisage today. But slavery itself is not always in these forms, with serfs epitomising the influence that people who are under partial slavery can have. Slavery is a spectrum itself, while death is not. You cannot have varying degrees of being dead, you are either dead or not dead. Moreover Finley notes that people are more prone to judge themselves based from the bottom of the spectrum, slavery, as opposed to the top, freedom. Freedom is a western concept whilst slavery is a constant. Thus the term is incorrect for slavery as a whole. Socially dead slavery exists, but social death is not
However it is more appropriate for this period than the Classical Era. The largest slave trade during this period was that of Sub-Saharan Africa by the Muslims, since during the twelve centuries that it was running, roughly fourteen million Africans were transported. Very explicitly these were viewed as less than human, hence why the men were castrated. Moreover many of the notions that the Europeans used later in the New World have their origins here, like having unbridled sexual lust. Unsurprisingly their descendants are extinct in all but a few areas today, because of the mistreatment they suffered. These slaves exacerbate social death in the extreme, as the word for slave in Arabic, abd, transformed to refer to a black person. Moreover this was the case for other groups of slaves too including the slave trade that emerged in the Black Sea, where treatment was equally harsh. Conversely though, when viewing instances of slavery that appear on the fringes, there once again appear instances which do not fit this model. An illustration of this is Christian Slavery. Once a man became a Christian he was “a(s) bondslave of God”. All his actions were to be in accordance with His will, as opposed to their own. Clearly this does not fit into social death, as this was voluntary by those who followed Christ. In effect this was man choosing slavery over the freedom to act …show more content…
In both the Classical Age and the Modern Era, it was the exception. Only in the Medieval Period was it truly synonymous most of the time because of the great exploits committed by the Muslims. Historians who have tended to categorise slavery as social death like Davis and Patterson, can be correct in the specific cases that they look at because these instances are the typical instances of slavery that we envisage today. But slavery itself is not always in these forms, with serfs epitomising the influence that people who are under partial slavery can have. Slavery is a spectrum itself, while death is not. You cannot have varying degrees of being dead, you are either dead or not dead. Moreover Finley notes that people are more prone to judge themselves based from the bottom of the spectrum, slavery, as opposed to the top, freedom. Freedom is a western concept whilst slavery is a constant. Thus the term is incorrect for slavery as a whole. Socially dead slavery exists, but social death is not