The final BAMS Brown bag lecture this semester will occur on Monday May 10th in 206 Trabant University Center from 12:15-1:10. Howard Johnson will be the main speaker and you will find his topic and a summary below. Please share this with your colleagues and graduate students and especially invite your undergraduate students to come. – James
Creole Retailers in Post-Emancipation Jamaica, 1838-1900
Featuring:
Howard B. Johnson
Francis H. Squire Professor of Black American Studies and History
University of Delaware
In reconstructing the world of Creole( native-born) retailers in post-emancipation Jamaica, this paper re-examines the entrenched scholarly view that virtually no retail system existed in this period.More specifically, it refutes the argument that lower-class blacks without resources, did not enter the retail trade and that Jews and the coloured middle class avoided commercial activities because of status considerations.The paper discusses the role of those groups in distributing the core items of material life, food and clothing. It also suggests how aspects of those services left them vulnerable to Chinese and Lebanese competition by the closing years of the nineteenth century.
James M. Jones, Director
Black American Studies
University of Delaware