Dissertations and Theses

Date of Award

2026

Document Type

Thesis

Department

History

First Advisor

John N. Blanton

Second Advisor

Emmanuel Lachaud

Keywords

apprenticeship, enslavement, freedom practices, abolition, amelioration

Abstract

The four-year period of apprenticeship in Jamaica was a critical period in the transition of labor relations between enslaver/enslaved and master/apprentice. This study examines the Abolition of Slavery Act of 1833 and colonial office records to consider the ways masters and apprentices interpreted property-in-labor and how they employed those interpretations to begin negotiation what a 'free labor' sugar economy might look like post-apprenticeship. Using the lens of freedom practices to examine colonial dispatches and court records, I construct the apprentice understanding of their new labor relation. Apprenticeship meant a new legal status where individuals were no longer chattel, and the apprentices leveraged this new legal status and labor relationship with their masters to begin delineating the acceptable bounds of treatment for a newly 'free' labor force.

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