The Life and Landscape of Slave Women in Guadeloupe from the XVIIth to the XIXth Century

Abstract

Slavery started in Guadeloupe in the XVIth century and lasted until 1848. Slavery created in Guadeloupe a society based on domination of colonists over the oppressed slaves. This thesis is about life and landscape of slave women in Guadeloupe from the XVIIth to the XIXth century. In this regard I have focused on theories which are related to domination and resistance, feminism, race and the cultural landscape linked to slavery. Slave women endured the pressures of slavery and were very much challenged in their life because of their gender and their status as slaves. This affected all aspects of their life.

The thesis sought to address the following questions: What was the image presented of slave women? In what ways was slavery discriminatory against slave women and why? How did slavery affect the everyday life of slave women? How did slave women respond to slavery? How did slave women influence the cultural landscape and intangible cultural heritage? To answer these questions I have studied the following topics related to slave women in Guadeloupe: marriage policy, policy in the matter of birth, different types of work undertaken by slave women, resistance by slave women, the lives of slave women seen through a TV serial, and the cultural heritage. The study of these topics shows that there were many hindrances to marriages between male slaves and female slaves. Moreover slave women were often exposed to violence and sexual assault. Being pregnant was not an easy or even enjoyable thing for these women because of the yoke of slavery. There was even a time when colonists tried to motivate pregnancy among slave women to provide the future slave generation. The slave women were meant to work hard either in the field or in the different buildings used to process sugar and rum. Some of them worked in the house of the masters however when compared to men women were at the bottom of the workforce scale. The only thing they could do to fight this world of injustice and suffering was the practice of resistance. Nonetheless, they also contributed to the creation of a landscape of plantations, production of rum and sugar and to an intangible cultural heritage.