Culture

Roster of Membership in the Society of Friends of Blacks, 1789

Jacques Brissot founded the Society of the Friends of Blacks in 1788 to agitate against the slave trade and slavery itself. Brissot modeled the Society on the London Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade established in 1787.

Grievance List (September 1789)

The Haitian free blacks and creoles, many of them substantial property owners and slaveholders, sent delegates to the National Assembly in France with a list of their stated grievances and demands.

The Coffee Planter of Saint Domingo (London, 1798)

Here Pierre Joseph Laborie provides the perspective of the planter. He gives a detailed description of the organization of enslaved labor in the production of coffee.

The Slaves from Africa

The African born enslaved people brought with them to Haiti their African rituals and customs, but the white planters also tried to get them to accept French manners and mores.

The Maroons

In this passage, Moreau de Saint–Méry explains that runaways in Haiti, known as Maroons, are and have always been a persistent problem and details the tremendous efforts put into retrieving the runaways. Despite this effort, some Maroons survived and thereby regained their freedom.

That Seductive Mulatto Woman

Moreau de Saint–Méry painted a particularly negative portrait of mulatto women in Haiti. He paints Creole women as unduly promiscuous and a threat to morals and decency.

Constance Pipelet, Review of a Book by Théremin, On the Condition of Women in a Republic

In this review of a book by an author favorable to women’s education, Pipelet argues that republics should demonstrate a different attitude toward women than monarchies.

New Zealand, Maoris at Their Talking House

The photograph shows Maori men, women, and children arranged for a group portrait on the porch of a whare or wharenui (meeting house) in New Zealand. This ceremonial structure, also called a talking house, and the marae (grassy area in front of it) are central to Maori social order and culture.

Epistolae: Medieval Women's Latin Letters

African American Women Writers of the 19th Century