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The Human Tradition in the Atlantic World, 1500–1850

Edited by Karen Racine and Beatriz G. Mamigonian

This collection of compact biographies puts a human face on the sweeping historical processes that shaped contemporary societies throughout the Atlantic world. Focusing on life stories that represented movement across or around the Atlantic Ocean from 1500 to 1850, The Human Tradition in the Atlantic World, 1500–1850 explores transatlantic connections by following individuals whose experience took them far beyond their local communities to new and unfamiliar places. A formidable barrier, the Atlantic Ocean profoundly influenced the lives it touched. For some brave or desperate souls, it offered an escape, a source of adventure or romance. For countless others, it provided a steady source of income. For those who voluntarily undertook the voyage, crossing the Atlantic meant hope for a better, happier life; for the millions of less-fortunate others who relocated because they had been enslaved, tricked, or banished, the Atlantic was a sea of sorrow and loss.

Yet, whatever the reason, tremendous creativity and dynamism resulted from contact between people of different cultures, classes, races, ideas, and systems in Africa, Europe, and the Americas. At its most fundamental level, the syncretic nature of Atlantic world societies was created and re-created on a daily basis by myriad choices made by hundreds of thousands of individuals. By emphasizing movement and circulation in its choice of life stories, this readable and engaging volume presents a broad cross-section of people—both famous and everyday—whose lives and livelihoods took them across the Atlantic and brought disparate cultures into contact.

Contributions by: Robert D. Aguirre, Troy Bickham, Olwyn M. Blouet, Sarah Cline, Andrew B. Fisher, John Garrigus, Noah L. Gelfand, Mark Hinchman, Charlene Boyer Lewis, Gail Danvers MacLeitch, Beatriz G. Mamigonian, Mark Meuwese, Joan Meznar, John Navin, Jeff Pardue, Magnus Roberto de Mello Pereira, Cassandra Pybus, and Karen Racine.

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

Pages: 286 • Trim: 6 x 9⅛

978-1-4422-0697-7 • Hardback • November 2010 • $119.00 • (£92.00)

978-1-4422-0698-4 • Paperback • November 2010 • $48.00 • (£37.00)

978-1-4422-0699-1 • eBook • November 2010 • $42.50 • (£33.00)

Series: The Human Tradition around the World series

Subjects: History / Americas (North, Central, South, West Indies), Biography & Autobiography / Historical, History / World

The Human Tradition in the Atlantic World, 1500–1850

Hardback

Paperback

eBook

Summary

This collection of compact biographies puts a human face on the sweeping historical processes that shaped contemporary societies throughout the Atlantic world. Focusing on life stories that represented movement across or around the Atlantic Ocean from 1500 to 1850, The Human Tradition in the Atlantic World, 1500–1850 explores transatlantic connections by following individuals whose experience took them far beyond their local communities to new and unfamiliar places. A formidable barrier, the Atlantic Ocean profoundly influenced the lives it touched. For some brave or desperate souls, it offered an escape, a source of adventure or romance. For countless others, it provided a steady source of income. For those who voluntarily undertook the voyage, crossing the Atlantic meant hope for a better, happier life; for the millions of less-fortunate others who relocated because they had been enslaved, tricked, or banished, the Atlantic was a sea of sorrow and loss.

Yet, whatever the reason, tremendous creativity and dynamism resulted from contact between people of different cultures, classes, races, ideas, and systems in Africa, Europe, and the Americas. At its most fundamental level, the syncretic nature of Atlantic world societies was created and re-created on a daily basis by myriad choices made by hundreds of thousands of individuals. By emphasizing movement and circulation in its choice of life stories, this readable and engaging volume presents a broad cross-section of people—both famous and everyday—whose lives and livelihoods took them across the Atlantic and brought disparate cultures into contact.

Contributions by: Robert D. Aguirre, Troy Bickham, Olwyn M. Blouet, Sarah Cline, Andrew B. Fisher, John Garrigus, Noah L. Gelfand, Mark Hinchman, Charlene Boyer Lewis, Gail Danvers MacLeitch, Beatriz G. Mamigonian, Mark Meuwese, Joan Meznar, John Navin, Jeff Pardue, Magnus Roberto de Mello Pereira, Cassandra Pybus, and Karen Racine.

Details

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

Pages: 286 • Trim: 6 x 9⅛

978-1-4422-0697-7 • Hardback • November 2010 • $119.00 • (£92.00)

978-1-4422-0698-4 • Paperback • November 2010 • $48.00 • (£37.00)

978-1-4422-0699-1 • eBook • November 2010 • $42.50 • (£33.00)

Series: The Human Tradition around the World series

Subjects: History / Americas (North, Central, South, West Indies), Biography & Autobiography / Historical, History / World

Author

Karen Racine is associate professor of history at the University of Guelph, Canada. Beatriz G. Mamigonian is professor of history at the Universidad Federal de Santa Catarina, Brazil.

Table of Contents

Introduction: The Human Tradition in the Atlantic World
Karen Racine and Beatriz G. Mamigonian
Chapter 1: Catarina Álvares Paraguaçu (1510s–1582): Indian Visionary in Brazil and France
Joan Meznar
Chapter 2: John Billington and His Family (c. 1582–1630): Doomed "Knave" of Plymouth Plantation
John Navin
Chapter 3: Samuel Cohen (c. 1600–1642): Jewish Translator in Brazil, Curaçao, and Angola
Mark Meuwese
Chapter 4: William Lamport/Guillén de Lombardo (c. 1611–1659): Mexico's Irish Would-Be King
Sarah Cline
Chapter 5: Jacob Leisler (1640–1691): German-Born Governor of New York
Noah L. Gelfand
Chapter 6: Hendrick/Tiyanoga/Theyanoguen (1680–1755): Iroquois Emissary to England
Troy Bickham
Chapter 7: Sir William Johnson (1715–1774): English Emissary to the Iroquois
Gail Danvers MacLeitch
Chapter 8: Henry "Harry" Washington (1750s–1790s): A Founding Father's Slave
Cassandra Pybus
Chapter 9: Julien Raimond (1744–1801): Planter, Revolutionary, and Free Man of Color in Saint-Domingue
John Garrigus
Chapter 10: Anne Pépin (1758–1837): Entrepreneur, Landlady, and Mixed-Race Signare in Senegal
Mark Hinchman
Chapter 11: João da Silva Feijó (1760–1824): Brazilian Scientist in the Portuguese Overseas Empire
Magnus Roberto de Mello Pereira, Translated by Ana Maria Rufino Gillies with assistance from Ian Robert Gillies
Chapter 12: Juan Antonio Olavarrieta (1765–1822): Basque Cleric and Libertine Rebel in Mexico
Andrew B. Fisher
Chapter 13: Eliza Fenwick (1766–1840): Feminist Slave Owner in Barbados
Olwyn M. Blouet
Chapter 14: Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte (1785–1879): Napoleon's American Sister-in-Law
Charlene Boyer Lewis
Chapter 15: James MacQueen (1778–1870): Agent of Imperial Change in the Caribbean and Africa
Jeff Pardue
Chapter 16: William Bullock: (1773–1849): British Museum Curator and Showman in Mexico
Robert D. Aguirre
Recommended Reading
Filmography

Reviews

A refreshing counterpoint to the existing literature, The Human Tradition in the Atlantic World helps us understand at the individual level how the Atlantic was shaped. Featuring sixteen men and women who not only crossed the ocean, but traversed imperial, cultural, and linguistic barriers, this collection admirably illustrates the entangled and dynamic nature of the Atlantic world.
— Wim Klooster, Clark University

This collection introduces a vibrant array of individual lives that Atlantic history might have otherwise forgotten. The contributors to this volume have revealed Jewish translators, Indian visionaries, African entrepreneurs, Iroquois emissaries, and revolutionary men (and women) of color that were part of a dazzling, multicultural Atlantic. Scholars and students will be able to follow the intersecting human itineraries of the Atlantic world like never before.
— Neil Safier, University of British Columbia; author of Measuring the New World: Enlightenment Science and South America

Approaching the interconnected Atlantic world through the experiences of individuals of many different ranks and positions, as these essays do, draws students in and gives them more direct access to the kinds of skills and risk-taking that made that world function.
— Karen Ordahl Kupperman, New York University

The Human Tradition in the Atlantic World is packed with exemplary lives that can only be appreciated in an Atlantic context. These are not textbook heroes, but rather ordinary people caught in the slipstream of Atlantic history in the Age of Sail. Their stories, so well told here, bring this transformative era to life—they give it flesh and bones.
— Kris Lane, College of William & Mary

Features

Uses the perspective of individual life stories to explore key themes: slavery, migration, exchange of ideas, religious conversion, science and environment, and gender

Considers historical trends from an Atlantic perspective by highlighting the lives of people who moved from region to region

Covers North America, the Caribbean, South America, Africa, and Europe

Traces the lives of both little-known along with prominent characters

Based on extensive archival and bibliographic research

Includes an extensive annotated list of films related to Atlantic world history

The Human Tradition in the Atlantic World, 1500–1850

Edited by Karen Racine and Beatriz G. Mamigonian

The Human Tradition in the Atlantic World, 1500–1850

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