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Quote by Stephanie E. Smallwood

“The migrant chain that connected Africa to America was seemingly endless, however, and its length was due primarily to the market. Africans made to ‘buy more’ Africans were thus compelled to be the agents of their own exploitation by an economic system that consumed the very lives of slaves. At stake for Africans was whether an American generation of African lineage would emerge and, more important still, also whether that generation could sustain itself by the fruit of its social networks, rather than by its labor, as bought and sold on the market.”

Quote by Stephanie E. Smallwood

Work

Saltwater Slavery: A Middle Passage from Africa to American Diaspora

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Author

Stephanie E. Smallwood

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“The terror of sickness and old age is not merely the terror of the losses one is forced to endure, but also the terror of the isolation. As people become aware of the finitude of their life, they do not ask for much. They do not seek more riches. They do not seek more power. They ask only to be permitted, insofar as possible, to keep sharing the story of their life in the world - to make choices and sustain connections to others according to their own priorities. In modern society we have come to assume that debility and dependence rule out such autonomy.”