Caribbean History

Caribbean History Syllabus

Caribbean History Practice Questions

SECTION A

THEME 1: THE INDIGENOUS PEOPLES AND THE EUROPEANS

• Migration and settlement patterns
• Taino, Kalinago and Maya practices
• Motivating Factors that led to Columbus’ voyages: “Gold, God and Glory”
• Impact of Europeans on Indigenous people
• Impact of Indigenous people on the Europeans

THEME 2: CARRIBEAN ECONOMY AND SLAVERY

• Economic revolutions: sugar and mahogany
• Social, political and economic consequences
• Accessibility, Affordability, demand, attempts to justify slavery of Africans
• Trans-Atlantic Trade: Organisation, impact on West African Societies and experiences of its victims
• Mahogany, logwood, cotton, coffee and cocoa production
• Physical layout and use of labour (male and female)
• Sugar production:field, factory and shipping; rum production: fermentation, distillation ageing and bottling.
• Markets for sugar and rum; profitability, risks
• African cultural forms: religion, language, dress, music, dance, food, and medicine
• Social relations: class, gender, ethnic relations

THEME 3: RESISTANCE AND REVOLT

• Slave control: legal, economic, psychological, social, ideological, physical and cultural
• Forms of resistance (male and female): insurrectionary and non-insurrectionary
• Maroon societies:origins and development
• The Haitian Revolution: causes and course
• Consequences of the revolution for Haiti and the wider Caribbean: social, economical and political
• Major Revolts (Berbice 1763; Barbados 1816; Demerara 1823; Jamaica, 1831)-causes, nature, consequences

SECTION B

THEME 4: METROPOLITAN MOVEMENTS TOWARDS EMANCIPATION

• Responses to revolt: negative effects on slavery, positive effects on the emancipation process
• Attitudes towards slavery; arguments of interest groups for and against slavery- Economic, humanitarian and religious
• Anti-slavery movements: early protest, organised campaign, Caribbean reactions outstanding personalities.
• Amerlioration: aims, features and results.
• British Emancipation Act: main clauses–freedom, apprenticeship, compensation.
• Apprenticeship: features, conditions, responses, results.
• The Emancipation Act: attitude to planters, attitude to ex-slaves

THEME 5: ADJUSTMENTS TO EMANCIPATION 1836-1876

• Problems of sugar industry: labour, capital, technology, free trade.
• Attitudes to labour: landowners, employers, free persons
• Schemes of migration: European, African, Maderians, Indians, Chinese.
• Economic effects of migration: supply, production, viability; Impact of labour supply on plantation, utilities, social services (schools).
• Contribution of peasantry: social economic and political.
• Crown Colony government: Old Representative Government, popular disaffection, changing Colonial office policy.

THEME 6: CARIBBEAN ECONOMY 1875-1985

• Factors which caused decline
• Measures to resolve crisis
• Growth of Cuba’s sugar industry
• Growth and survival of alternative agriculture
• Industrial development factors
• Effects of industrialisation

SECTION C

THEME 7: THE UNITED STATES IN THE CARIBBEAN 1776-1985

• Reasons for United States’ interest in the Caribbean
• Factors/conditions-imperialism, trade routes, national security; political instability, foreign interferences and ideological conflict as seen in: Cuba (1898), Puerto Rico (1898), Panama (1903), Haiti (1915), Dominican Republic (1916), Grenada (1983).
• Economic, political and cultural consequences of United States’ involvement in territories listed above. Policies of Castro’s revolution.
• United States’ response
• Impact of Castro’s revolution
• Impact of United States’ involvement in the English-speaking Caribbean

THEME 8: CARIBBEAN POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT UP TO 1985

• Early attempts- Leeward Islands 1674, Leeward Islands 1871, Winward Islands 1874-1876. Economic, political and social reasons for failure.
• Moyne Commission, outcomes of protest and riots, trade unions, political parties, adult suffrage and self-government
• Movement to establish a federation: Reasons for unity-economic, social and political similarities. Role of the Colonial office.
• Reasons for failure- economic, social and political factors.
• Personalities involved in interrogation: early life, education, career, philosophy, and impact on movement.
• Alternatives to independence

THEME 9: CARIBBEAN SOCIETY, 1900-1985

• Social and economic conditions: housing, cost of living, working conditions, unemployment and health.
• Organisations involved in improving living conditions: trade unions; governments (policies); women’s organisations; United Negro Improvement Association (UNIA)
• Aspects of social life: ethnic/race relations, festivals and celebrations, recreation, transport and communication, art forms (architecture, visual and performing arts.
• Religious groups: Christian churches-established and evangelical; Hindu; Muslim; African- Christian syncretic religions, for example Orisha, Shango; Kumina, Revivalism, Spiritual Baptists; indigenous religions, for example Rastafarianism.
• Implications of membership: social, economical adn political.