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Keith: In very broad terms, what is slavery?
And, when did slavery exist and who did it affect?
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Dr. Michele Reid-Vazquez: Okay, well
that's very broad question.
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But, so I'll try to be succinct.
So slavery or enslavement as I tend to…
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because it's a process that's imposed upon people...but
it's a structure.
It often includes political, economic factors as the
drivers
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and of course has a major impact
on the social relations that are connected to it.
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So it is forcing...one group of people's enforcement
of another people...group of people to do their
bidding.
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Typically it's labor, domestic, agricultural,
construction,
any kind of labor that you can think of,
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and also the process involves, at least particularly the
process
in the Americas…because it was a very distinct type of
enslavement.
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Slavery is a very old institution
but there are different formulations of it,
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say in Europe, in Asia and on the continent of Africa
that were very, very distinct from what happened in the
Americas.
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So in the Americas in particular the process
was one of dehumanization or encommodification.
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So it basically was designed to transform
human beings into objects for... to sell.
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Keith: Who did it affect?
Did it...did it affect just one race of people?
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I know we're talking about one race specifically, but did
it…did it have
broader effects than just the Black people that... that we
know about?
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Dr. Michele Reid-Vazquez: So, again, focusing on the
Americas in
particular, so it has…it actually has an impact from top
to bottom.
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I mean certainly the people…
the Africans who were enslaved and their descendants
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who were enslaved bore the brunt of the brutality, of the
degradation,
of the subjugation, and oppression. All of that.
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But certainly those who were imposing it upon
them also had to lose their... parts of their humanity as
well…
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as they tried to dehumanize another group…
they... their humanity was also put at risk.
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And so certainly, as I... when I talked…
when I teach this to my students,
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I use a documentary called “Slavery in Jamaica,”
and at the end of it they're really upset because
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they say, “this...this documentary
was not about slavery,
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it was basically about the White people who,
who were imposing slavery and who ran the
institutions.”
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I said that's because there... it's a whole system.
It's not just one... I'm not…
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it's not just about the people who are enslaved,
although we want to know very much about
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those conditions and their
acts of resistance and agency living in it.
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But it's also about, we cannot forget it put people in
power.
It put Europeans in power to maintain these systems of
hierarchy and racism.
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So it is not just one group that's involved in this,
it's multiple groups... those who are in power,
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those who have less power, those who
have kind of, adjacent power dynamics,
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all of those groups are involved in it even, and you know
we also
think about those who are, people of African descent who
own slaves as well.
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So, again, they're part... I found my students
are very unforgiving of those groups and I say
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well you know you have to understand, this is the way
people…
this is the system in place this, is the model for
success,
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for economic well-being, for social advancement, and so
they were
doing the things that in many cases their parents...at
least one of their parents
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was most likely a wealthy planter depending
on where you were, so they were just doing the things
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that the colonial world deemed to be…
deemed to be what you had to do in order to be
successful.
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So I'm more forgiving... they but…they have, they're
when…
they want to see things, you know it's either this way or
that way
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but all that to say that it's…these systems are very
much
intertwined but it's not…it's not just about one, but
it's about the entirety,
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and I think and that's the part I try to impress
upon my students, that of course my interest is in the
diaspora,
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but within a larger system and we have to understand the
dynamics
of that so we talk about, you know the different
hierarchies, we talk about,
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you know, the tensions within the European groups and the
within
and with those who are, the White population that's born
in the Americas
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because their distinction between those two…
they make those distinctions in the colonial world,
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as well as the enslaved population and the population
of
African descent that is also…that is free so there's a
lot of different layers.
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And then if you... depending on where you are in the
Americas
there's a large Indigenous population that also gets
folded into that.
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So there's a lot to consider but…so you have to really
think about
the whole piece if you want to understand the different
elements of it.
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Keith: Is slavery still going on?
Do we still see elements or remnants or leftovers of
colonial slavery?
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Dr. Michele Reid-Vazquez: Absolutely. Absolutely.
It is in the levels of poverty that we see,
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the levels of inaccessibility to education, to economic
opportunity,
to health disparities, all of those are legacies of the
enslavement process.
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I mean, it was centuries in the making, so they
don't…
they didn't disappear after 1865 in our case,
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or after 1888 in Brazil, or after you know,
well a... it's early this as the 1790s in Haiti.
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So there's... there... we've been…there's an ongoing
effort to
extract ourselves from it, to finally release ourselves
from it.
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But the problem has been that at the end, with the
abolition of slavery,
lots of…most countries maintained some remnant of
it.
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So in the US there was a Jim Crow system,
in Latin America, more distinct but they had…
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there was certain... there was…
in some cases there were laws, in other cases
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it was more about tradition and practice,
and so... or and non-recognition of the colonial race
relations.
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So they often would say for Latin America that it's a
racial democracy,
we don't have, we don't have those kinds of laws, the Jim
Crow laws of the US.
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And so we don't have... we don't have a racial problem
here.
But the reality is it... it takes different forms.
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Just because it's not exactly like what
happened in the US, doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
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And so scholars have spent a lot of time working to
dismantle these
racial ideologies…these racial democracy ideologies.
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And they've called them the, you know, presented them as
myths
of racial democracy because that is what they are.
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Yes, they're distinct from the US, but you, you... going
there
even with the…with an American lens it's still very,
very easy to see.
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And so I often even had debates with my colleagues
in…
in places like Cuba, about affirmative action and ways
to…
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to help uplift the impoverished…
those groups that are still impoverished or are still,
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dealing with the aftermath of enslavement
and the discrimination in the in post-emancipation
societies.
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And they often... the response has been well, we... our
constitution says
everyone is equal, and I say well, our constitution says
everyone is equal.
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And I say, you know and... so let's look around, you
know.
Let's...let's, you know, where... where we stand right
now…
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what do you see on the street corner, on the street, or in
front of you?
Is ever... does everyone have equal access to
education,
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to economic opportunity, to jobs, to…to any array of
things.
And then you know there's the slow recognition of,
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okay well I'm like... I'm just…I'm not trying to create
drama,
I'm just saying…I'm just pointing out the obvious
like,
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I'm seeing this, if you don't see this
tell me what you see. I just want to
understand.
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So it's an ongoing conversation and
there's still a long, long way to go.
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We can see part of that in the country,
but also by the way the immigrant communities
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that have grown up here…
the way that they also bring these ideologies with
them,
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and... and don't and have a harder…
have a difficult time, kind of fitting into
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the American paradigm that in other ways flattens
out what..who Latinos are culturally speaking.
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We have made Latino to be a category that does not include
Blackness.
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And so that's been really difficult for populations
that are coming from Cuba, from Mexico,
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from Puerto Rico, that all have, you know,
that have some elements of African heritage.
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How do they end up fitting it... fitting in here…
have lots of conversation... conversations with students
from those…
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whose parents or grandparents are from those regions
trying to make
sense of where they fit in the US because we have some
very hard lines here.
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And you know it's... it's... it's a challenge,
but I think because there are so many... because we're in
the 21st century
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because we have so many more Afro-Latinos
that... that's becoming more present even though
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they've been here for a really long time…of seeing
them in, you know, I think probably
easily most represented in TV and film,
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things that people have greater access to finally
beginning to say…oh that I didn't know, you know,
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why did they have the last name Torres or something like
that?
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Or they, you know proudly proclaim as we see now,
they're…
they're Afrolatindad, that their Afro-Latin
heritage…things like that.
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So it's becoming more, visible, but we still have a
long way to go, I think, in a lot of ways... a lot of
cases.
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Keith: So, a couple things stemming from what you just
said…
so the like the structure of... of slavery and racism as
it…
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as it was born...it was so ingrained
in the cultures and societies that when Jim Crow took
effect
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and other things like, you know, when abolition
happened,
was it hard to separate, to separate society from that
immediately?
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Because it seems like, if it was ingrained
for hundreds of years you can't just stop... so... so,
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what were some of the... what were some
of the issues with that, if that's the right way to ask
that question?
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Dr. Michele Reid-Vazquez: Yes sure, I mean you're
absolutely right.
It doesn't just end with a law being passed, that is
certainly not the case.
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Not the case in the US,
that's certainly not the case in Latin America and the
Caribbean.
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In many cases... some place…
in some places there's still colonialism,
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in places like throughout... throughout the Spanish
Caribbean,
for example, at the end of enslavement.
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So there... so... but in many…but in most cases they
were looking…
trying to figure, before abolition came,
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they were trying to figure out ways to contain the
enslaved population,
to… to provide… they often looked at gradual
emancipation processes.
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So apprenticeships were often pretty…
kind of a common way to go... to try…to one, make sure
that their…
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that the plantar class was enumerated for their,
for losing the profits they were going to lose
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even though the enslaved population
received nothing for their labor.
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But so then trying to figure out a way to gradually shift
the…
from enslavement to, to a free... a real free labor
market.
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But on top of it there are lots of different kinds of
laws
that were put in place to restrict the movement,
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Really they were just trying to perpetuate enslavement as
this coercive kind of labor force in a way, in a space
that, where slavery was abolished.
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And so... and again it really depends on
where you go but for... but for the most part they
were…
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those in power we're trying to
make sure that the enslaved, the formerly…
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the now free Black populations, would continue to be
subservient,
continues to, to work cheaply to do all those, all of
those kinds of things.
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So in a nutshell, I mean there's a lot of variation.
But in a nutshell, that's what's happening throughout the
Americas.
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Keith: That's intense. Why did you specifically,
gravitate toward Latin America? Like, what's that interest
for you?
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Dr. Michele Reid-Vazquez: That's a great question. I would
say
from a very early age I've been having…had an interest
in Puerto Rico.
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People... I grew up in a small town in Georgia
and people were constantly asking me where I was from,
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because my parents aren't from there…
they both went to work at the…
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at the local college and there's a navy base,
so I think that that's partly where it's come from.
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But I would get questions all the time
and one regular question was, are you Puerto Rican?
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And I'll just go, “what??”
Why are you asking me these questions?
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Because I always was always asked
where are you, like, where are you from?
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Because even though I was born there,
my family's not from there and people,
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I guess, they could just... they could just tell that it
wasn't…
and, so that's where the Puerto Rican part came,
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became an active interest for me, and in college there
was,
I went to school in Atlanta, it was a large Caribbean
population.
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And so I gravitated toward them, and just…
and that is what kind of maintained my interest.
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And I've always been interested in Spanish.
I majored in Span... majored in Spanish and music
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and decided that I, you know,
wanted to know more about Latin America and the
Caribbean.
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And so the next stop…
I was, again, still very much interested in Puerto
Rico,
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and... but... but I realized that because of its,
its status as... as not foreign enough
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because it's connected to the US and to
American to be in the…
