Researching The Slavery Past in the Netherlands Conference - - PDF document

Researching The Slavery Past in the Netherlands

Conference presentation for ‘Een Gedeelde Geschiedenis – Gesprekken over het Slavernijverleden’. Tropenmuseum Amsterdam, 9 February 2017. by Alex van Stipriaan The bookshelves in my study contain about 4 meters of books on the history of the Dutch slave trade, slavery and marronage in Suriname and the Dutch Caribbean. That does not include the large number of scholarly articles on the same subject I keep in folders and on my

• computer. Of course, much of those studies are quite old, and not all are written by

researchers from the Netherlands. However, at this moment 5 universities (VU, Leiden, Radboud, Erasmus and Groningen) participate in research which addresses Dutch slavery and/or its heritage, as well as three academic research institutes (KITLV, IISG, Meertens). This also means that history students in these universities are presented academic knowledge

• f the Dutch slavery past. At least some 40-50 researchers that I know of, most of whom have

a PhD degree or are busy working on one, publish on a regular basis scholarly articles and books on Dutch slavery-and/or-its-legacies and they work in- as well as outside of academia. If we take a look at the situation in schools, then we see that slavery as a compulsory subject is included in the curriculum goals prescribed by the government, and every history education method, (school books), dedicates attention to slavery and quite a lot of educational web sites

• n slavery can be visited. So, the slavery past might have been a taboo or a hidden subject in

the past, now it isn’t anymore, it’s taken care of, we can lean back and turn to another subject which deserves our attention. Or can we? The crucial thing, of course, is the content of all this research and educational material, the audiences they address, the language they use, the sources they consult, and the sustainability, impact and dissemination of that knowledge. A first observation in praxis might be that about no more than about one in every eight to ten researchers is of African descent, the overall majority is European white. And moreover, most

• f these Afro-researchers have no academic affiliation. Some of them were affiliated with the

NiNsee Institute, but that ended when the national Dutch government stopped funding the institute just before the commemoration of a 150 years of the Abolition of slavery. This is not compensated for by academic researchers working in Suriname or on the Dutch Caribbean islands, because academic research on slavery there is very little. So, the question is, of course, whether there shouldn’t be more academic input from Afro- researchers in this field. Which actually is a question about the meaning and importance of color and historical background in writing slavery history, or put differently: is a history of slavery and its legacies written by a white researcher different from the work of a black academic researcher? And if we would conclude that it is, what should be done then? What should we do about the lack of black researchers in our field as well as the lack of a relevant number of black history students in Dutch universities. And in this situation, what then is inclusive history, what is shared history, what is multi-vocal history if the researchers of history and the producers of historical knowledge share in majority a comparable Dutch background? And is this situation unavoidable in a society in which no more than around 3 %

• f the population is of enslaved African descent. And if unavoidable, how can multi-vocality

still be guaranteed? Now, let’s turn to the contents of slavery research today. A remarkable recent event was the reprint of a book which had been published for the first time 15 years ago, however, now, with its 5th edition received more national publicity than ever. It is called The Robbing State, sub title: What every Dutch should know!, by Ewald van Vugt, and he addresses the Dutch atrocities of colonialism and slavery in South-East Asia and the Caribbean. It seemed like for many Dutch, white and black, for the first time the horrific historical truth was unveiled, despite my 4 meters of Dutch slavery books. A much less known, however, also interesting debate, took place in the venerable, more than

• ne and a half century old journal of The Royal Netherlands Historical Society, (The Low

Countries Historical Review), in 2014, when one of its issues was partly dedicated to the theme of Apologizing for history. One of the authors, a professor of white Dutch descent is an

enthusiastic supporter of Michael Rothberg’s dialogical historiographical approach, meaning not sticking to competing hegemonic versus subaltern memories, however, focus on what he defines as, multi-directional memories produced in interaction and intercultural dynamism. Let’s call it a sort of sharing history by discussing the oppositional historical positions. One of the other authors, Francio Guadeloupe, an Afro-Dutch professor of Anthropology added to that, a plea for a permanent revolution on the basis of a common responsibility to repair the evils of the past, much more than a black and white scheme of victims and offenders. Again a kind of sharing history by taking responsibility to face it, work on its legacies and participate constantly in a critical interaction. Very recently also, was the publication of two books in Dutch, both by journalists of Afro- Caribbean descent, one called The Hebrew identity, a study into the identity of people of African descent, the other title is Away with mental slavery. Both books refer for their argument much to the slavery past in Suriname and Curaçao, however, they hardly use results

• f Dutch academic research at all. Still they are widely read and debated among Afro-Dutch,

for instance on ‘black’ radio stations. These three examples, the Robbing State-book, the debate on how to deal with a traumatic history, and the two books on Afro-identity, show that a lot is going on, however, there is not much sharing. Different approaches, different languages, different sources, different audiences. Now, to conclude, I will present to you a very quick overview of academic studies of the Dutch slavery past. It focuses on the Atlantic region; studies of Dutch slavery in the Indian Ocean area are still in their infancy (Baay, van Rossum).  In the Atlantic sphere most research during the last decades has been directed towards slavery in Suriname, way less to slavery in the Dutch Caribbean islands, and even lesser to Dutch Guyana (Berbice, Essequibo, Demerara), Dutch Brazil, and the coasts

• f West and Central Africa.

 Particularly the older studies, addressed mainly economic and political issues, from a very colonial, eurocentric point of view, in which the enslaved hardly appeared as actors.  Since the 1980/90s this research has shifted to a more social-economic approach, in which the enslaved appeared much more prominently. Quite a bit was written on resistance, on living and labor conditions, on women, on social relations; and often the plantation as an economic as well as a social unit was the framework for that research. Researchers became aware of the, until then, hegemonic eurocentric approach and at least tried to include other perspectives as well.  Meanwhile also a lot of cultural historical research had been undertaken, mainly by anthropologists and mainly focusing on maroons. However, it showed much more than historical studies the agency and human and cultural dimensions of the enslaved who escaped.  After the turn of the century these approaches were continued (for example the current Leiden project ‘Paths through slavery: urban slave agency and empowerment in

colonial Suriname, 1733-1863’ and the ‘Suriname slavery and its legacies’ project by this author. However, it seems as if the rise of Atlantic and Global studies started to

• vershadow this research, and made economy, politics and to a certain extent

eurocentrism, return on stage at the cost of the enslaved and their history. Another side

• f that coin might be research which is focused on computing how much money was

earned by slave-labour and should be repaid as reparations for slavery.  The latter brings me to a new direction which was taken during the last decade, and which looks for the slavery past in the Netherlands itself. This probably started with the project ‘Searching for the silence; traces of the slavery past in the Netherlands, and is now in full swing with the nation wide project of the VU: Mapping Slavery, which has already resulted in several guides of cities showing locations where links to the slavery past can be found. This kind of research shows how the Dutch dealt and still deal with their slavery past and how Dutch society is structurally based on that past. This links up with rising interest in the history of the descendants of the enslaved in The Netherlands and the legacies of slavery they experience here.

 It seems like the slave experience itself has a bit disappeared from the research stage,

• r may be even has never been full front on stage yet at all, which might be the reason

that slavery’s legacies in the former colonies as well as in this society are research wise still in their infancy. The latter has consequences for public history on slavery. So far there have been three documentary series on Dutch slavery history on public television, one in 1983, one in 2003, one in 2011. They did address the atrocities of slavery, however, they were not free

• f colonial undertones, to put it that way.

All school history books mention Dutch slavery, but in some slavery in the USA is given as much or even more attention, which is a distraction from one’s own history. A recent survey has shown that in the four most popular history methods in NL during the last years the relative number of pages dedicated to Dutch slavery has decreased, which also goes for the multi-perspectivity and the number of slavery related subjects. It still is a preliminary survey, however, the first results are no reason to be optimistic. A couple of weeks ago a new edition was published of one these popular books (MeMo). In its edition

• f two decades ago it dedicated 5,9 percent of its pages to slavery, one decade ago this had

decreased to 3.9 per cent, now it turns out to have dwindled to 2,3 per cent, 6,5 pages, of which no more than slightly over 1 page is dedicated to the Netherlands. It is true that the whole book is about European history, not specifically Dutch history, but still. These books are produced for a life cycle in school of approximately a 10-year period. What should we do? Probably the best way to change something is to directly turn to the history teachers, because other research has shown that there is a world to win. It turned out that in a survey

• f 16 history teachers in secondary education in Amsterdam, the amount of time dedicated

to slavery varied from less than one school hour (50 minutes) to 12. Moreover, it turned

• ut that those schools which spent less time on slavery are whiter than the others. Which

indicates that history of slavery is less meaningful for white youngsters. Another study found that only when this kind of, what is called “sensitive” history, is presented in project form youngsters as well as teachers identify with history of slavery and make it part of their historical consciousness. This means that the attitude, interest and method of teachers are of crucial importance, but not much tools have been developed so far to support them.

(source: Ineke Mok, 2011) In museums the situation is not much different. They are centers of expertise, they do research, produce stories and educate. This museum, the Tropenmuseum, was almost two decades ago the first museum in the Netherlands to dedicate a small part of its permanent exhibition to the Dutch slavery past and the enslaved experience. In hindsight, a lot can be said about the way it was done then, however, apart from a substantial number of temporary exhibitions in other museums, and the temporary existence of the NiNsee exhibition, this presentation has stayed the only permanent one, apart from a very small presence in the Rijksmuseum. And now it is going to be refurbished. So maybe we should help them to make the best possible representation in the future. Or should we forget about the established museums and opt for an autonomous slavery museum?

That brings me to my final question. What actually is the best way to share the results of all kinds of research, and present this in the most sustainable way to the largest possible audience in order to make it at least a shared dialogue?

• Prof. dr. Alex van Stipriaan, Erasmus University Rotterdam

stipriaan@eshcc.eur.nl www.alexvanstipriaan.com