The Economies of End of Empire workshop

The Centre for Economic and Business History (CEBH) is hosting a workshop on 'The Economies of End of Empire' on Wednesday 28 January 2015.

Speakers:

• Andy Pearson, Pearson Archaeology Ltd: Profit, loss, and profiteering: economies of Abolition on the island of St Helena
• Reshaad Durgahee, Geography, University of Nottingham: Geographies of the sweet tooth: Mauritius and the business of indenture 1834-1917
• Spencer Mawby, History, University of Nottingham: "Golden Handshake" or "Slap in the Face": Settling Accounts at the End of Empire in the Anglophone Caribbean

The abolition of the trans-Atlantic slave trade in 1807, and the abolition of slavery in the Atlantic in 1833 (only really effective 1838), arguably marked the end of the first British Empire. However, the policy of the British to stop the Atlantic slave trade of other nations did not mean that they were prepared to properly finance the survival of freed Africans in the Atlantic. Nor did it mean that the British no longer required cheap enforced labour in its eastern empire. Two hundred years after the abolition of slavery in the British Atlantic, the British were still not prepared to take responsibility for how this had affected the long-term development of the Caribbean. This workshop focuses on the relationship between slavery (in various forms), abolition, and the end of empire, and what importance this had for the various economies of the British empire.

The workshop is free, but participants are asked to register in advance through the University of Nottingham online store.

More information about the event is available on the website of the Centre for Economic and Business History, or for more details email Dr Sheryllynne Haggerty.