Black Women in the Slave Trade

Throughout the slave trade, black women often were represented and observed through the sexually repressed European perspective that viewed them as immoral and promiscuous.

Many viewed black female’s lack of modesty as a sign of their impaired moral nature and increased sex drive.

The view of the African female as a manipulating temptress thus emerged and it was believed that she used it to her advantage to achieve favours and obtain prestige.

It wasn’t just the men that sexually abused the enslaved women. According to Shepherd, some white working class women who owned enslaved Africans females rented them out as prostitutes. The children born to these enslaved women were then brought up by the slave owner until they were weaned and then were sold off (Gettysburg, Nd).

Planters, slave owners and slave masters had absolute right and power sexually over the female slaves.

They used them for prostitution for income.

The plantation owners used the slave women for ‘breeding’.

The production for children for sale was finically good for the slave system.

Elizabeth Fenwick found no important reason for differentiation morally between urban slave owners who deployed slave women as prostitutes and the plantation owners who used them for breeding purposes (Milwood and Min, 2014).

Barracoons and the encouragement of slave women to have children were of great benefit financially for slave owners and planters.

In sententious expression, prostitution of slave women was an extension of the slave trade business.

Seeing the purpose of slavery was economical.

To conclude, that prostitution was prevalent throughout the slave trade system.

According to Edward long of the late eighteenth century, Jamaican enslaved women were predisposed with the propensity to activate sexual with profiency and without moral reflections (cited in Milwood and Min, 2014).

In the book sex work and sex workers by Dank and Refinetti (1999) suggest that since the 1970s, the Caribbean such as Barbados it has become famous country for ‘female tourist’ (Dank and Refinetti, 1999, p. 96). Males search the island for single ‘female tourists ‘(Dank and Refinetti,1999, p. 96). This is called sex tourism. To explain what it is, when rich women tourists come to the Caribbean and pay a “beach boy” for sex. His appearance is based on the female’s notion of a hyper sexual black male, hair often dreadlocked, to suggest an untamed primitive nature (Kempadoo, 1999, p.46).

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“you know why some of the girls like the knot-up hair? When some girls send photos and stuff up to England, you don’t see any clean – cut men. They send a picture of a Rasta so when a girl come down here they think a Rasta is a real Caribbean man, so that is why they go for the Rasta. But some of them does get fool them does get an imposter” (cited in Kempadoo, 1999, p. 46).

The reason why these boys are having sexual relations with female white tourist is the desire of money. However, the women do not see themselves as prostitutes so they define it has holiday romance. Davidson and Taylor (1999) states that among women surveyed, many of them see they are helping these boys out financially by giving them money and other treats (Kempadoo, 1999, p.48). This can relate back to the Atlantic slave trade where black women were used for sex by the white slave owners (Kempadoo, 1999).

The historical link to the beach boys and white female tourists relates not only ‘colour hierarchy ‘but also gender. In the slavery 200 ago, when white men had the power to do anything to a black female. Elridge Cleaver in his book “Soul on Ice.” Cleaver explains that the sexual attraction between the black man and the white woman ‘the Primeval Urge’ (Miller, 1997, p.26). Franz Fanon argues that by getting with a white woman the black man proves to himself his importance and it allows him to make up for his inferior feelings caused by slavery (Albo, Nd, no pagination). This singularity is also connects with conventional concepts of the ‘hypersexual Caribbean male Cynthia Enloe (feminist) expresses of the relation to the Caribbean sex tourism as “the new plantations,” she states that it mirrors the old system of the slave trade many years ago; where white males were dominating black women slaves ‘(Albo, Nd, no pagination).

Black individuals have been victims of social stigmas which continues to shape society today. Where they have been damaged during slavery trade such as ‘sexual slavery’ is evidence of the lack of freedom and the ‘consent to prostitution’ (Butler, 2015, p. 130). ‘Similarly, pornographic videos and ‘mainstream magazines have also promoted the sexual stereotyping of Black men as sex machines with a particularly ravenous desire for sex with White women (cited in Butler, 2015, p. 130). ‘These sexual stereotypes fuel today’s demand for sexual tourism with women of colour’ (cited in Butler. 2015, p. 130).