







































..... 

151 

Women Seeking Freedom: 

Gender, Oppression & Resistance in 

Caribbean Slave Society 
Jessica Zlotnik 

 
Jessica Zlotnik was born and raised in Toronto and is currently pursuing a specialist 

in political science and a minor in Diaspora and Transnational Studies. Her interests 

include gender relations, and the history of diasporic groups within Canada. Jessica 

is also active in mentoring first year undergraduate students at the University of 

Toronto. 

 

 How did race and class affect the life chances of women within 
Caribbean slave society? While women differed at the intersections 
of race and class, they nonetheless experienced oppression as a result 
of their gender. The plantocracy attempted to define the role of 
women, but they responded by resisting this power through various 
forms. While white women enjoyed higher status within Caribbean 
slave society, they did not enjoy the freedom and mobility of their 
male counterparts. Therefore, white women sought autonomy by 
participating in the urban market economy where they would act as 
entrepreneurs.1 For slave and free women of colour, opportunities 
for upward mobility were severely limited. Therefore, work 
disturbances, cultural resistance, and participation in the internal 
market economy provided an opportunity to assert some degree of 
independence. Though women of colour were often forced into 
sexual partnerships with prominent white men, they sought to 
reclaim their power by seeking freedom and other benefits.2  
 
 The purpose of this paper is to examine how gender, race and 
class shaped both the oppression of women in the Caribbean, and 
their responses to it. As historian Barbara Bush has argued, if white 
women and women of colour had anything in common, it was that 

                                            
1 Hilary McD Beckles, Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean Slave 

Society (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 65.  
2 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 282.  



CARIBBEAN QUILT | 2012 

152 

they were subordinate to all men.3 However, their experiences could 
hardly be described as similar. It is important to emphasize the 
extent to which racism worked to limit and restrict the lives of black 
and brown women within Caribbean slave society, when compared 
to their white counterparts. Thus, while all women in Caribbean 
slave society faced difficulties in asserting their independence (albeit 
in varying degrees), they nonetheless struggled against the 
limitations imposed on them by the powerful planter elite.  
  
 Race by far played the most determining factor in how women 
were viewed and treated by the plantocracy. While white women 
occupied the highest status of all women within Caribbean slave 
society, questions remain as to the role they played within the system 
of slavery. Some historians believe that white women were 
dependent and voiceless victims trapped in a patriarchal order 
imposed by their men4, while others assert that they were active 
participants and beneficiaries within the slave system.5 There is also 
the persistent belief that white women were even more cruel than 
white men in their treatment of slaves and free women of colour.6 
What remains certain is that white women who resided in the 
Caribbean during slavery remain an under-examined group.  
  
 While all women in Caribbean slave society faced gendered 
oppression, white women remained exempt from the additional 
burden of racism. Since freedom was passed down matrilineally, 
white women became the torchbearers of freedom, and thus enjoyed 
the protection of the powerful planter elite.7 This meant that despite 
class divisions, white women fared far better than their black or 
brown counterparts. Racial prejudice dictated how women were 
perceived and as a result, white women were painted in a favourable 
light. While black and brown women were seen as morally 

                                            
3 Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838 (Shepherds Hill: 

Villiers Publications, 1990), 8. 
4 Pedro L.V. Welch, Slave Society in the City-Bridgetown Barbados-1680-1834 

(Miami: Ian Randle Publishers Inc., 2003), 129.  
5 Pedro L.V. Welch, Slave Society in the City-Bridgetown Barbados-1680-1834 

(Miami: Ian Randle Publishers Inc., 2003), 127.  
6 Barbara Bush-Slimani, “Hard Labour: Women, Childbirth and Resistance in 

British Caribbean Slave Societies,” in David Barry Gaspar and Darlene Clark Hine 

(eds.), More Than Chattel: Black Women and Slavery in the Americas 

(Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1996), 194.  
7  Hilary McD Beckles, Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean Slave 

Society (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 62. 



JESSICA ZLOTNIK | 

WOMEN SEEKING FREEDOM IN CARIBBEAN SLAVE SOCIETY 

153 

degenerate and sexually promiscuous, white women were perceived 
as being demure and monogamous.8 However, this was not always 
the case. In the early stages of slavery, poor white women 
experienced both class and gender discrimination but as slavery 
matured, the status of all white women was elevated above women of 
colour, regardless of class.9  
  
  It appears that white women sought autonomy through 
financial independence, but their success depended on where they 
resided. While those in rural areas often lacked opportunities for 
independent financial gain, urban areas provided more 
opportunities. The large number of white women in Barbados meant 
that many remained unmarried and untied to plantation 
households.10 Their financial independence meant that there was a 
greater tendency for them to participate in the market economy as 
autonomous agents giving them more freedom than their rural 
counterparts.11 Since powerful white men dominated the centre of 
the urban economy, many white women operated on the periphery 
as owners and managers of taverns, sex-houses, and slave rental 
services.12 While the urban economy provided white women with 
greater independence in a society based on patriarchal power, it 
could also work to further subjugate women of colour. Some white 
women were slave owners, and some would profit from the wage 
earnings of black and brown female prostitutes, as well as the 
ownership and sale of any resulting children.13 The informal 
economy, thus allowed white women to exert considerable autonomy 
independent of male ownership. However, many working-class white 
women within the Barbados were unable to gain access to these 
opportunities. The occupations which they would have previously 

                                            
8 Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838 (Shepherds Hill: 

Villiers Publications, 1990), 12-13. 
9 Hilary Beckles, “Black Men in White Skins: The Formation of a White Proletariat 

in West Indian Slave Society”, Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 

XV; 1 (Oct. 1986): 13 quoted in Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean 

Society 1650-1838 (Shepherds Hill: Villiers Publications, 1990), 12.  
10 Hilary McD Beckles, Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean Slave 

Society (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 64.  
11 Hilary McD Beckles, Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean Slave 

Society (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 64.  
12 Hilary McD Beckles, Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean Slave 

Society (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 65. 
13 Hilary McD Beckles, Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean Slave 

Society (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 65. 



CARIBBEAN QUILT | 2012 

154 

filled became unthinkable because of their association with both 
blackness and enslavement.14 Professions such as cooks, 
seamstresses and maidservants had once been the livelihood of poor 
white women, but by the end of the eighteenth century, became the 
domain of female slaves.15 This resulted in the rampant poverty of 
white women within Barbados.16   
 
 The black woman faced the most oppressive discrimination 
because of her race. In Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in 
Caribbean Slave Society, historian Hilary Beckles asserts that the 
black woman became completely defeminized and recast as the 
“Amazon.”17 This process allowed slave owners to justify her 
subjugation to a destructive material and social environment.18 It 
also meant that whites came to believe that black women could 
withstand working without recuperation, dropping children at will, 
manipulating at ease the physical environment of the sugar estate, 
and being more productive than men.19 The racism directed at 
Africans would only increase throughout the late eighteenth and 
early nineteenth centuries, taking on a more explicitly biologically 
based tone as slavery matured.20 Racism and sexism meant that the 
fieldworker (which was often female), was treated as the capital 
stock of the plantation (on par with the animals) and maintained at 

                                            
14 Melanie Newton, “Defining Freedom in the Interstices of Slave Society,” 

Chapter 1 in The Children of Africa in the Colonies: Free People of Color in 

Barbados in the Age of Emancipation (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University 

Press, 2008), 29.  
15 Melanie Newton, “Defining Freedom in the Interstices of Slave Society,” 

Chapter 1 in The Children of Africa in the Colonies: Free People of Color in 

Barbados in the Age of Emancipation (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University 

Press, 2008), 29.  
16 Melanie Newton, “Defining Freedom in the Interstices of Slave Society,” 

Chapter 1 in The Children of Africa in the Colonies: Free People of Color in 

Barbados in the Age of Emancipation (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University 

Press, 2008), 29. 
17 Hilary McD Beckles, Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean Slave 

Society (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 10. 
18 Hilary McD Beckles, Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean Slave 

Society (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 10.  
19 Hilary McD Beckles, Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean Slave 

Society (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 10.  
20 Trevor Burnard, Master, Tyranny, and Desire-Thomas Thistlewood and His 

Slaves in the Anglo-Jamaican World (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina 

Press, 2004), 131.  



JESSICA ZLOTNIK | 

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155 

bare subsistence level.21 The harshness of fieldwork often led to low 
productivity which was linked to various forms of resistance 
undertaken by the fieldworkers.22  
 
 While resistance has often been associated with large scale 
revolt or rebellion, smaller acts of resistance appear to have been 
frequently utilized by enslaved women within the Caribbean. This is 
based on the fact that many European planters documented that 
female slaves in the West Indies were more troublesome than men.23 
Jamaican planter Matthew Lewis commented on the insubordinate 
nature of his female slaves, stating that they tended to be more 
insolent and aggressive.24 The concerns articulated by Lewis do not 
appear to be unusual indicating that slave women did in fact play an 
important role in resisting their enslavement. 25  
 
  It appears that a significant number of slave women risked 
the wrath of their white masters by using verbal abuse and 
insolence.26 On the Kings’ Success Plantation in Demerara - 
Essequibo, there appears to have been a number of cases involving 
insolent slave women.27 For example, the female slave Quasheba was 
repeatedly punished for refusing to go to work when ordered by the 
doctor, as was May Caroline for abusing the manager and overseer.28 
Slaves Clarissa and Lavinia were also repeatedly punished for 

                                            
21 Barbara Bush-Slimani, “Hard Labour: Women, Childbirth and Resistance in 

British Caribbean Slave Societies,” in David Barry Gaspar and Darlene Clark Hine 

(eds.), More Than Chattel: Black Women and Slavery in the Americas 

(Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1996), 196.  
22 Barbara Bush-Slimani, “Hard Labour: Women, Childbirth and Resistance in 

British Caribbean Slave Societies,” in David Barry Gaspar and Darlene Clark Hine 

(eds.), More Than Chattel: Black Women and Slavery in the Americas 

(Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1996), 196. 
23 Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838 (Shepherds 

Hill: Villiers Publications, 1990), 53. 
24 Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838 (Shepherds 

Hill: Villiers Publications, 1990), 53. 
25 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 234-235. 
26 Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838 (Shepherds 

Hill: Villiers Publications, 1990), 60. 
27 Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838 (Shepherds 

Hill: Villiers Publications, 1990), 58. 
28 Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838 (Shepherds 

Hill: Villiers Publications, 1990), 58. 



CARIBBEAN QUILT | 2012 

156 

resisting work obligations.29 It appears that slave women utilized the 
master’s dependence on their labour as a form of protest. Since 
productivity was crucial to the economic viability of the master, work 
refusal remained an endearing form of resistance.  
 
 Cultural practices were another way that slave women could 
resist their oppression. There is evidence to suggest that slave 
women led one of the most fundamental forms of verbal    
expression: the song.30 They used this medium as they toiled in the 
fields using artistry and often malice, making penetrating statements 
about themselves, or heaping ridicule upon their masters.31 This 
annoyed and disturbed planters, particularly after 1791 when songs 
in the British-colonized territories mentioned Haiti.32 William 
Beckford documented that this style of singing was exclusive to the 
female field gangs, and that men would rarely join in the chorus, 
except under extraordinary circumstances.33 The dress and body 
could also be manipulated in an effort to alter social representation 
and relations of power.34 During rebellions, slaves would often use 
clothing in order to ridicule their masters.35 This may have occurred 
because in some African religions, clothing has potency and is 

                                            
29 Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838 (Shepherds 

Hill: Villiers Publications, 1990), 58. 
30 Olive Lewin, “The Role of Women in Jamaican Folk Music,” Savacou 10 (1974) 

and J.B. Moreton “Manners and Customs”, 152-153 quoted in Lucille Mathurin 

Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, eds. Hilary McD 

Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd  (Kingston: The University of the West Indies 

Press, 2006), 235. 
31 Kamau Brathwaite, “The Development of Creole Society, 1770-1820,” 221-

225 and Orlando Patterson, “The Sociology of Slavery,” 253-259 quoted in 

Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, eds. 

Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 235.  
32 Verene A. Shepherd, Women in Caribbean History-The British-Colonised 

Territories (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 61.  
33 Kamau Brathwaite, “The Development of Creole Society, 1770-1820,”  225 

quoted in Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-

1844, eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University 

of the West Indies Press, 2006),  235.  
34 Steeve O. Buckridge, The Language of Dress-Resistance and Accommodation 

in Jamaica-1760-1890 (Kingston: The University of the West Indies Press, 

2004), 78. 
35 Steeve O. Buckridge, The Language of Dress-Resistance and Accommodation 

in Jamaica-1760-1890 (Kingston: The University of the West Indies Press, 

2004),  80. 



JESSICA ZLOTNIK | 

WOMEN SEEKING FREEDOM IN CARIBBEAN SLAVE SOCIETY 

157 

strongly connected to the spiritual world.36 Thus, some may have 
believed that this practice could have helped in the defeat of the 
enemy.37 Another way that dress could be used as a tool of resistance 
was for runaway slaves.38 If a slave woman could save enough money 
to buy shoes, stockings, and a dress made of fine fabric, she may 
have been able to pass herself off as free.39 With limited resources, 
slave women found ways to utilize fabrics in order to distance 
themselves from their enslavement. Cultural resistance was an 
accessible way for women to protest the injustices of their society. It 
also provided a “cultural shield” which helped to insulate the slave 
woman from the brutality of plantation life.40   
 
 An urban environment provided even more opportunity for 
slave women to curtail their oppression. In the urban context, skilled 
and domestic female slaves as well as those involved in self-hire, 
marketing, and selling could acquire a certain degree of autonomy,  
despite of their enslavement.41 The slave-dominated marketing 
system, urbanization, and the practice of self-hire helped to foster 
the development of huckstering which was one of the few skilled jobs 
dominated by slave women.42 Within these broad categories of urban 
occupations, slaves handled their owner’s money as well as their own 

                                            
36 Steeve O. Buckridge, The Language of Dress-Resistance and Accommodation 

in Jamaica-1760-1890 (Kingston: The University of the West Indies Press, 

2004), 80. 
37 Steeve O. Buckridge, The Language of Dress-Resistance and Accommodation 

in Jamaica-1760-1890 (Kingston: The University of the West Indies Press, 

2004), 80.  
38 Steeve O. Buckridge, The Language of Dress-Resistance and Accommodation 

in Jamaica-1760-1890 (Kingston: The University of the West Indies Press, 

2004), 80.  
39 Steeve O. Buckridge, The Language of Dress-Resistance and Accommodation 

in Jamaica-1760-1890 (Kingston: The University of the West Indies Press, 

2004), 83.  
40 Barbara Bush-Slimani, “Hard Labour: Women, Childbirth and Resistance in 

British Caribbean Slave Societies,” in David Barry Gaspar and Darlene Clark Hine 

(eds.), More Than Chattel: Black Women and Slavery in the Americas 

(Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1996), 196.  
41 Pedro L.V. Welch, Slave Society in the City-Bridgetown Barbados-1680-1834 

(Miami: Ian Randle Publishers Inc., 2003), 157.  
42 Melanie Newton, “Defining Freedom in the Interstices of Slave Society,” 

Chapter 1 in The Children of Africa in the Colonies: Free People of Color in 

Barbados in the Age of Emancipation (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University 

Press, 2008), 34. 



CARIBBEAN QUILT | 2012 

158 

and acquired valuable skills.43 If a slave woman was extremely lucky, 
the relationships she forged through long-term absences from the 
masters or mistresses’ residence could result in manumission with 
property.44  
 
 Women of mixed European and African ancestry were 
somewhat better received by the plantocracy because of the 
preference for lighter skin.45 A paler complexion meant that the 
mixed-race woman enjoyed a position of relative privilege on the 
plantation.46 Their white connections combined with the frequent 
identification of pale skin with physical frailty meant that the brown 
woman was often exempted from the most menial estate tasks which 
were found in the fields.47 However, despite the fact that brown 
women enjoyed a marginally higher status than their black 
counterparts, they nonetheless were subject to oppression by the 
planter class. Many women of mixed African and European ancestry 
were selected for house work, but this by no means meant that these 
women enjoyed lives of unqualified privilege.48 The round the clock 
demands of the household greatly restricted the physical freedom of 
the mixed-race woman.49  
 
 Though black and brown women faced oppression as a result 
of their race, class factors cannot be ignored. Brown women were 

                                            
43 N.A.T. Hall, “Slavery in Three West Indian Towns: Christiansted, Fredericksted 

and Charlotte Amalie in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Century,” in 

B.W. Higman (ed.), Trade, Government, and Society in Caribbean History, 1700-

1920: Essays Presented to Douglas Hall, 1983, 30.  
44 Pedro L.V. Welch, Slave Society in the City-Bridgetown Barbados-1680-1834 

(Miami: Ian Randle Publishers Inc., 2003), 157. 
45 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 270.  
46 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 269.  
47 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 269.  
48 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 269. 
49 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 269.  



JESSICA ZLOTNIK | 

WOMEN SEEKING FREEDOM IN CARIBBEAN SLAVE SOCIETY 

159 

more likely to ascend to a higher social position however; factors 
such as education and material wealth divided them.50 Free women 
of colour who were the wives of wealthy and educated free men of 
colour had a high social status.51 Property ownership was also a 
determining factor in social status, and the elite free woman of 
colour who was fortunate enough to obtain property may have been 
better off economically than some white women.52  
 
 The frequency of white and brown concubinage resulted in the 
stereotyping of the brown woman as “temptress.” This is exemplified 
in the writings of Moreau de Saint-Mery in which he describes a 
woman of mixed European and black ancestry: “The entire being of 
the mulatresse is dedicated to sensual pleasure, and the fire of that 
goddess burns in her heart until she dies....”53 While this depiction 
indicates that the brown woman actively seduced white men, 
evidence suggests that sexual relationships were often forced upon 
women of colour.54 However, they sometimes sought to utilize these 
unions for the betterment of themselves and their children.55 Long-
term sexual relationships with white men could provide the 
possibility of either freedom or social advancement for the brown 
female.56 Historian Lucille Mathurin Mair argues that the mixed-race 
woman was relatively well placed within Caribbean slave society to 
name a high price for her favours.57 Without an abundance of white 
women, the law of supply and demand gave mixed-race women 

                                            
50 Verene A. Shepherd, Women in Caribbean History-The British-Colonised 

Territories (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 73. 
51 Verene A. Shepherd, Women in Caribbean History-The British-Colonised 

Territories (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 73. 
52 Verene A. Shepherd, Women in Caribbean History-The British-Colonised 

Territories (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 73. 
53 Médéric-Louis-Élie Moreau de Saint-Méry, excerpt from “Description… of the 

French Part of the Island of Saint Domingue,” in Laurent Dubois and John D. 

Garrigus (eds.), Slave Revolution in the Caribbean 1789-1804: A Brief History 

with Documents (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2006), 59. 
54 Hilary McD Beckles, Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean Slave 

Society (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 23.  
55 Marietta Morrissey, Slave Women in the New World-Gender Stratification in 

the Caribbean (Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1989), 148. 
56 Marietta Morrissey, Slave Women in the New World-Gender Stratification in 

the Caribbean (Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1989), 148.  
57 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 282.  



CARIBBEAN QUILT | 2012 

160 

considerable bargaining power.58 White and brown partnerships 
often developed with the understanding that a deal had been struck 
between the parties concerned, and mutual advantages negotiated.59 
Marietta Morrissey asserts that free women of colour were more 
likely than slaves to develop beneficial relationships with powerful 
white men.60   
 
 Along with both white and black women, the woman of 
mixed-race sought financial improvement through the urban market 
economy. The dynamics of the town helped to shape the dominant 
image of the brown woman as someone economically active and 
viable.61 Mixed-race women faced brighter prospects in urban areas 
where they could run profitable hotels or lodging-houses.62 The 
owners of these houses were known for their skills in herbal 
medicine, and were said to be excellent nurses.63 Women of colour 
could also improve their financial lot through the selling of goods, 
sewing64, and the hiring-out of slaves.65  
 
 While all women found it difficult to assert their autonomy 
within Caribbean slave society, they nonetheless sought ways of 
resisting the oppression imposed on them by the plantocracy. While 
white women resisted traditional gender roles through their 

                                            
58 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 282. 
59 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 282.  
60 Marietta Morrissey, Slave Women in the New World-Gender Stratification in 

the Caribbean (Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1989), 148. 
61 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 278. 
62 Verene A. Shepherd, Women in Caribbean History-The British-Colonised 

Territories (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 74.  
63 Verene A. Shepherd, Women in Caribbean History-The British-Colonised 

Territories (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 75.  
64 Verene A. Shepherd, Women in Caribbean History-The British-Colonised 

Territories (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999), 75.  
65 Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844, 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd (Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2006), 279. 

 

 



JESSICA ZLOTNIK | 

WOMEN SEEKING FREEDOM IN CARIBBEAN SLAVE SOCIETY 

161 

participation within the urban market economy, black women used 
work refusal, cultural resistance, and the internal marketing system 
as ways of resisting their enslavement. While white, black and brown 
women did not have equal access to resources, they all sought the 
benefits of the urban market economy as a way of improving their 
lot. Therefore, it is evident that while the plantocracy sought to 
maintain their power, women attempted to resist it. While the 
experiences of women were diverse and complex, resistance helped 
to counteract gendered and racial oppression within Caribbean slave 
society.  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 



CARIBBEAN QUILT | 2012 

162 

Works Cited 
 
Beckles, Hilary. “Black Men in White Skins: The Formation of a White 

Proletariat in West Indian Slave Society.” Journal of Imperial and 

Commonwealth History, XV; 1 Oct. 1986: 13. quoted in  

 Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838.  

Shepherds  Hill: Villiers Publications, 1990.  

 

Beckles, McD Hilary. Centering Woman-Gender Discourses in Caribbean 

Slave Society.    

Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers Inc., 1999.  

 

Brathwaite, Kamau. “The Development of Creole Society, 1770-1820.” 

quoted in  

 Lucille Mathurin Mair. A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 

1655-1844. eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd. 

Kingston: The University of the West Indies Press, 2006.  

 

Buckridge, O. Steeve. The Language of Dress-Resistance and 

Accommodation in Jamaica-1760-1890. Kingston: The University of the 

West Indies Press, 2004.  

 

Burnard, Trevor. Master, Tyranny, and Desire-Thomas Thistlewood and 

His Slaves in the Anglo-Jamaican World. Chapel Hill: The University of 

North Carolina Press, 2004.  

           

Bush, Barbara. Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838. 

Shepherds Hill: Villiers Publications, 1990.  

 

Hall, N.A.T. “Slavery in Three West Indian Towns: Christiansted, 

Fredericksted and Charlotte Amalie in the Late Eighteenth and Early 

Nineteenth Century.” in B.W. Higman ed. Trade, Government, and 

Society in Caribbean History, 1700-1920: Essays Presented to Douglas 

Hall, 1983, 17-38.  

 

Lewin, Olive. “The Role of Women in Jamaican Folk Music.” Savacou 10, 

1974. quoted in  

  Lucille Mathurin Mair. A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 

1655-1844. eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd. 

Kingston: The University of the West Indies  Press, 2006. 

 

 



JESSICA ZLOTNIK | 

WOMEN SEEKING FREEDOM IN CARIBBEAN SLAVE SOCIETY 

163 

Mair, Mathurin Lucille. A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-

1844. eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd. Kingston: The 

University of the West Indies Press, 2006.  

                      

Méry-Saint, de Moreau Médéric-Louis-Élie. excerpt from “Description… 

of the French Part of the Island of Saint Domingue 1797.” in Laurent 

Dubois and John D. Garrigus eds. Slave  Revolution in the Caribbean 

1789-1804: A Brief History with Documents. New York: Palgrave 

MacMillan, 2006.  

 

Moreton, J.B. “Manners and Customs.” 152-153. quoted in Lucille 

Mathurin Mair. A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-1844. 

eds. Hilary McD Beckles and Verene A. Shepherd. Kingston: The 

University of the West Indies Press, 2006.  

 

Morrissey, Marietta. Slave Women in the New World-Gender 

Stratification in the Caribbean. Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 

1989.  

 

Newton, Melanie. “Defining Freedom in the Interstices of Slave Society.” 

Chapter 1 in The Children of Africa in the Colonies: Free People of Color 

in Barbados in the Age of Emancipation. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State 

University Press, 2008, 23-56.  

 

Patterson, Orlando. “The Sociology of Slavery.” 253-259. quoted in 

Lucille Mathurin Mair, A Historical Study of Women in Jamaica 1655-

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