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<jlibby@earthlink.net>
Jean Libby
M.A. thesis, 1991
San Francisco State University
Ethnic Studies
"African Ironmaking Culture Among African American Ironworkers
in Western Maryland, 1760 - 1850."
Abstract: This thesis investigatges technological transfer (diffusion)
of African ironmaking culture into western Maryland by enslaved
ironworkers. The major method is comparison with ironmaking societies
in West Africa at the time of enslavement, looking for similarities to
furnace technology and cultural practices. The slave worker furnace
population is described demographically at census intervals. African
American autobiographies, archaeological data, census manuscripts, legal
records, and advertisements are the primary sources use to describe the
group. Conclusions: Technological diffusion occurred and occupational
identity increased when workers made iron with methods similar to
African traditions. Their expertise was suited to forge work, where
there is evidence in records that slaves were clustered. Resistance to
slavery is a vital part of their history, based on African group
self-congruity and mutual aid as much as the assimilation of European
culture.
Surpervisors: A.Y. Yansane and Angela Y. Davis
[A very revised version of this thesis was published by Lousiana State
University in Conference Proceedings on Hispanic Languages and
Literatures in February, 1992, entitled: "Technological and Cultural
Transfer of African Ironmaking into the Americas and the Relationship to
Slave Resistance."]
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