The Other Slavery: The Uncovered Story of Indian Enslavement in America - Softcover

Reséndez, Andrés

Softcover

ISBN 10: 054494710X ISBN 13: 9780544947108

Publisher: Mariner Books, 2017

Synopsis

 “The Other Slavery is nothing short of an epic recalibration of American history, one that’s long overdue...In addition to his skills as a historian and an investigator, Résendez is a skilled storyteller with a truly remarkable subject.  This is historical nonfiction at its most important and most necessary.”—Literary Hub, 20 Best Works of Nonfiction of the Decade

“Long-awaited and important . . . No other book before has so thoroughly related the broad history of Indian slavery in the Americas.”—San Francisco Chronicle

“A necessary work . . . [Reséndez’s] reportage will likely surprise you.”—NPR

“One of the most profound contributions to North American history.”—Los Angeles Times

Since the time of Columbus, Indian slavery was illegal in much of the American continent. Yet, as Andrés Reséndez illuminates in his myth-shattering The Other Slavery, it was practiced for centuries as an open secret. There was no abolitionist movement to protect the tens of thousands of Natives who were kidnapped and enslaved by the conquistadors. Reséndez builds the incisive case that it was mass slavery—more than epidemics—that decimated Indian populations across North America. Through riveting new evidence, including testimonies of courageous priests, rapacious merchants, and Indian captives, The Other Slavery reveals nothing less than a key missing piece of American history. For over two centuries we have fought over, abolished, and tried to come to grips with African American slavery. It is time for the West to confront an entirely separate, equally devastating enslavement we have long failed truly to see.

“Beautifully written . . . A tour de force.”—Chronicle of Higher Education

About this title

From the Inside Flap

A landmark history — the sweeping story of the enslavement of tens of thousands of Indians across America, from the time of the conquistadors up to the early twentieth century
 
Since the time of Columbus, Indian slavery was illegal in much of the American continent. Yet, as Andrés Reséndez illuminates in his myth-shattering The Other Slavery, it was practiced for centuries as an open secret. There was no abolitionist movement to protect the tens of thousands of Natives who were kidnapped and enslaved by the conquistadors, then forced to descend into the “mouth of hell” of eighteenth-century silver mines or, later, made to serve as domestics for Mormon settlers and rich Anglos.  
 
Reséndez builds the incisive, original case that it was mass slavery — more than epidemics — that decimated Indian populations across North America. New evidence, including testimonies of courageous priests, rapacious merchants, Indian captives, and Anglo colonists, sheds light too on Indian enslavement of other Indians — as what started as a European business passed into the hands of indigenous operators and spread like wildfire across vast tracts of the American Southwest.
  
The Other Slavery is nothing less than a key missing piece of American history. For over two centuries we have fought over, abolished, and tried to come to grips with African American slavery. It is time for the West to confront an entirely separate, equally devastating enslavement we have long failed truly to see.
 

From the Back Cover

Praise for The Other Slavery
 
“Every now and then a new book comes along that throws a switch on our historical valences and makes us see ourselves anew. The Other Slavery is one such book. Much as Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee did when it first appeared in the early 1970s, Andrés Reséndez’s carefully sifted work fundamentally reshapes our understanding of a great enduring mystery: What really accounts for the swift and tragic demise of our continent’s indigenous peoples?”—Hampton Sides, author of Blood and Thunder and In the Kingdom of Ice
 
“In The Other Slavery Andrés Reséndez retells a vast section of Native American and North American history by putting forced labor in its multiple forms at the center. The result is a revealing, tragic, and heartbreaking history.”—Richard White, Margaret Byrne Professor of American History, Stanford University
 

Edition details

• Publisher: Mariner Books
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 054494710X
• ISBN 13: 9780544947108
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 448