The Other Middle Passage Analysis

Edward A. Alpers presents The Other Middle Passage as a discussion about the slave trade in the Indian Ocean. The main purpose of the essay is to shed light on what all was involved with the slave trade from East Africa. Alpers does an excellent job of comparing the way slaves were treated during this voyage and how they were treated when they reached their destinations. Both voyages, West to the Americas and East through the Indian Ocean, were just one part of the traumatic journey for these African Slaves. The Other Middle Passage also states that sea travel was just one part of the whole experience. Alpers strives to show the type of endurance and strong will it took to be uprooted into slavery and not only survive, but in some cases, thrive. I also want to show that the middle passage comprises of a much more complicated forced migration than is usually mentioned. From the moment they were enslaved and began their movement to the coast, captive Africans had to begin the process of personal survival and cultural adjustment. They learned new languages, were given new names, ate different food, and made new …show more content…
The Other Middle Passage does an excellent job of showing the reader what difficulties African slaves faced in that part of the continent. This essay makes a good case for importance of the slave trade in the Indian Ocean. The suffering that the slaves endured on both trade routes was horrendous. The point of this article was to discuss the conditions of the Africans slaves and how they survived. It is hard for one to imagine enduring the pain and exhaustion experience aboard those ships. The majority of the slaves that were traded in the Indian Ocean ended up in the Middle East or Asia. Sri Lanka has small population with African roots as a result of the slave