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British Scholar James Walvin on Migrations of Africans and Creation of Western Wealth, Sept. 21
 James Walvin, one of the most respected writers on the history of African slavery in the Atlantic world, will speak at the Barnard Forum on Migration on Tuesday, Sept. 21. at 7 p.m. His talk is titled Migrations of Africans and Creation of Western Wealth , and will take place in the Sulzberger Parlor, on the 3 rd Floor of Barnard Hall. Walvin, the British scholar who edited the journal Slavery and Abolition for almost 20 years, has published many books on the subject, including Black and White: The Negro and English Society 1555-1945 , winner of the Martin Luther King Memorial Prize in 1974. His latest book, An Atlas of Slavery , was published by Pearson-Longman this year. He is currently completing the Penguin Book of Slavery . He is a Professor of History at the University of York.
From the 15th to the 19th centuries, millions of Africans migrated against their wishes to the far side of the Atlantic. In time, and as European empires spread and prospered, African peoples were carried even further afield, to the distant corners of the globe. By the early 1800s, Africans and their descendants could be found in Liverpool and Lima, in Bridgetown and Botany Bay.
This was no ordinary migration of peoples. It was enforced and brutal and yet, despite that, it was a migration which had a simple economic function: to enhance the economic well-being of the Europeans and Americans who conceived and sponsored the system. More difficult however is to know how to calibrate precisely the nature and form of that material well-being. Walvin's discussion will suggest a broader approach to the economic and social impact of enslaved Africans in the economic transformation of the West: from the ubiquitous social habits of western life (smoking and drinking sweet tea) to the proliferation of grand homes across the face of urban and rural Europe. The social and economic culture of modern Europe was shaped in large measure by the efforts of Africans, in ways Europeans rarely recognize or accept.
Petra Tuomi, Office of Public Affairs, 212-854-7907, ptuomi@barnard.edu
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