Notes on Joyce Appleby’s “Relentless Revolution”

  Joyce Appleby’s “Relentless Revolution: A History of Capitalism” “explores the benchmarks of capitalism’s ascent through analyzing the capitalist system as it relates to practices, thoughts, values, and ideals present in the political formation of western society." Appleby’s conception of charting the evolution of capitalism as it is observed today is through the lens of …

“1696 Danckerts Map of Florida, the West Indies, and the Caribbean” #HGIS #georeference #Mexico

The reason this map captured my attention is because it showed Mexico as it was rendered by colonial geographers. Interestingly enough my focus on the map was less concerned with the hegemonic recasting of these landscapes deployed by Spanish conquistadors. My interest was in Malintzin, the enslaved Indigenous woman who was sold to Hernan Cortes, …

A Tale of Two Prostitutes-Notes on the Victorian Social Order

In the nineteenth century, a woman who owned property, made high wages, had sex outside of marriage (or outside the missionary position) and was not ashamed may well have been involved in nineteenth century sex work. These “public women” challenged and subverted the Victorian cultural universals that upheld traits of purity, piety, domesticity and submission …

War Capitalism: Notes on Sven Beckert’s Empire of Cotton #envhist

Sven Beckert’s Empire of Cotton examines the significant influence that the institution of slavery had on the foundation of the United States’ role in cotton production and dawning of global capitalism. In the years following the treaty of independence of 1783, the areas in the upper South where enslaved people were concentrated experienced a severe …

17th Century Legal Precedents on Race

Year Colony Latitude Longitude Key Provisions 1635 Barbados 13.19389 -59.5432 Governor declares that all Africans and Indians brought to the island to be considered enslaved unless they have a contract that says otherwise 1641 Massachusetts Bay 42.062868, -71.7184 Legalizes the enslavement of African captives within the colony 1643 Virginia 38.00354 -79.4588 Women of African descent …