Skin color alone marked chattel slaves regardless of other social position

Evidence

In the European slave trade that brought somewhere between 20 million and several hundred million kidnapped Africans to the Americas as chattel, the factor that made them slaves was their skin color. Nothing else about them mattered. Not surprisingly, the practice of the slave trade, in which hundreds of black people at a time were marched in chains, held in coastal forts, and crammed like cargo into ship holds increased a sense of superiority among whites involved and reinforced the discourses of inferiority that were already in place. — Rebecca A. Martusewicz, Jeff Edmundson, and John Lupinacci, EcoJustice Education, 1134

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Blackness is a social location, not actual skin pigmentation — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 460; Enslaved black women shared racial status with men but faced sexist subordination — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 150; Biracial people occupied an elevated but precarious position within slavery — Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning: The…, 299 (+10 more)

Broader Connections

• Blackness is a social location, not actual skin pigmentation #corroborates (0.90) — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 460
• Biracial people occupied an elevated but precarious position within slavery #qualifies (0.90) — Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning, 299
• American chattel slavery was uniquely heritable, permanent, and race-based #corroborates (0.90) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 89
• Racial identification is learned, not observed in skin color. #corroborates (0.90)
• Enslaved black women shared racial status with men but faced sexist subordination #expands (0.85) — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 150
• Slavery elevated white women’s social status above black people #expands (0.85) — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 449
• Racism exists as a variable spectrum, not a single invariant form #complicates (0.85)
• Slave status marked whites so indelibly that even race could not absorb the stigma #contradicts (0.85) — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 748
• Slavery does not necessarily entail racial categories #qualifies (0.85)
• Mixed-light complexions gain economic and social status in colonial societies #qualifies (0.85)
• Cultural attributes can be racialized even when skin tone matches whiteness #qualifies (0.80) — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 299
• Plantation slavery produced juridical racism, not the reverse #expands (0.80)
• Racism originated in internal relations among European peoples, not colonial contacts #contradicts (0.80)