Many times when we think of slavery we envision power relati

Many times when we think of slavery, we envision power relations that were completely dominated by one side. While this is true in many ways, slaves found many ways to resist the institution of slavery. How did slaves resist to protect their families and keep their kinship networks intact? What was their worldview and how did they cope with \"powerlessness\"?

Solution

Slavery as we relate to it in the past was due to several factors, the most important one was the lack of resources to survive on their own. Which might be difficult today but back then they were totally unpriviledged, they were not allowed to purchase items for themselves, they were supposed to live on their masters mercy.

They were not allowed to live in a free separate house, they had to face alienation in most areas. They were not allowed to do commerce, no one would buy from them, mostly not the masters and the other slaves did not have enough money to sustain on their own.

So, in this set up their dependence on the masters was very high, without the masters mercy, they did not have enough to survive on, and as the slaves had to run their family they in one way or other had to keep up with the system which they knew was detrimental to their own future.

But gradually they developed an alternate society, where the slaves, started saving as a group. As any hoarding is clearly visible, they acted as a group of families and made it a practice that they support each other. As the discriminations were severe and one wrong move caught by the masters led to loss of several days of food and other expenses, they depended on the other slave families. This also led to better education, more knowledge base and enlightenment in due course.

So, this brotherhood made them stronger and their dependency on the masters reduced. Slowly they started their own commerce, which were never huge but gave competition to other businesses. As they dealt in volumes and catered to masses they gained importance, not in the open market but secretly there were several tradings done within the slave societies, this made them sustainable and gae them enough to forgo the slavery and raise their voice to stop the practice. And so formation of a society of their own helped them to cope with the powerlessness.