2024/09/03 by Margaret Schotte · 1 voice
Social Sciences · #Global Maritime and Colonial Histories #Colonialism, slavery, and trade #Colonial History and Postcolonial Studies
paper · doi:10.1177/08438714241272583
openalex publication_date 2024/09/03 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
Over the course of the eighteenth century, French East India Company ships carried numerous sailors, soldiers, passengers and unfree labourers to and from various ports of trade in the Indian Ocean. Although European merchant companies developed extensive documenting systems, certain elements received little attention in the records. When it came to tracking unfree labourers, Company employees used terminology with ambiguous meanings and categories that were codified in the Atlantic context and therefore not initially applicable in the Indian Ocean. In order for historians to interpret these records more accurately, this article reviews specific terminology and pertinent French legislation about racialized labourers. This contextual information helps to uncover previously overlooked groups of unfree labourers working for - and, at times, trying to escape from - the French East India Company in the Indian Ocean and beyond.