Description
Book SynopsisA collection of around 350 letters bound for London from Jamaica reveals much about colonial life in 1756. Ordinary People, Extraordinary Times paints a picture of the daily life of poor and middling whites, free people of colour, and enslaved people against the backdrop of transatlantic slavery in Jamaica and the eighteenth-century British Empire.
Trade Review“Sheryllynne Haggerty introduces us to a terrific archive of letters, making brand new insights into colonial Jamaican history and wrangling an incredibly disparate set of sources into a lively examination of the desires, political interests, consumption patterns, family organizations, and restricted options of both free and enslaved people in the Caribbean. While previous scholarship tends to focus on the elite classes, Ordinary People, Extraordinary Times extends our understanding of colonial Jamaican society through an exploration of the everyday.” Daniel Livesay, Claremont McKenna College and author of Children of Uncertain Fortune: Mixed-Race Jamaicans in Britain and the Atlantic Family, 1733–1833
