Passage Discussion

[tzyc]

I'm a little confused between the 1st paragraph and 2nd paragraph...
In the 2nd paragraph the author points out the research is imcomplete because they underemphasize the law slowly limited their freedom (so the family in the example escaped before the law was enforced), so this means those people were not slaves at that time right?
But in the 1st paragraph the author emphasizes the importance to realize "what Africans were able to accomplish despite the effects of that institution (=the institution of slavery)" so I thought the author wants readers to recognize what they (slaves) accomplished during that period...so 1st paragraph is about slaves they brought from Africa and 2nd paragraph is about Africans who did not treated as slaves...Since they are different group of people, I'm not sure why the aurhor does not accept the research fully.
Or do both paragraphs talk about the same group of people?
Both are not about slaves, but about indentured servant? (how do they differ by the way? Since in the 1st sentence of the 1st paragraph the author uses the word "slavery" or "slaveholders" I thought they are the same but they are actually different? I think I'm confused there...)

[ohthatpatrick]

I see your confusion. Hopefully, the passage will make more sense if you re-read it knowing that in both paragraphs we're talking about NOT-slaves.

Not all Africans in the US during this time period were slaves. The author begins the passage by complaining that MOST scholarship tends to focus on slavery and the harm it did. TOO LITTLE scholarship deals with what Africans were able to accomplish despite that (this could refer to what slaves were able to accomplish despite being slaves and/or to what non-slaves were able to accomplish despite living in a society that included slaves).

Focus on line 10-12, when it says that "Breen and Innes focus not on slaves, but on a small group of freed indentured servants."

Indentured servants were more free than slaves -- I don't quite remember my US history, but I think they were servants for a given period of time, but once they had worked off a certain debt to someone then they were freed.

So the African Americans we're discussing in P1 and P2 are "freed" and (line 14) "maintaining their freedom".

In terms of the connection between P1 and P2, in P1 the author is mostly conveying happiness that these scholars are focusing on what freed African Americans were doing (as opposed to how slaves were suffering).

In P2, the author starts to critique aspects of the study. Our author thinks the study overlooks the growing anti-black forces that may have driven these African Americans out of the Chesapeake Bay region.

Hope this helps.