Middle Passage

And they're part of how we imagine our bodies today, how our bodies are imagined, right, at the level of population, public health, thinking, demographic, et cetera, et cetera.

So first is that relationship between the blood relic and and quantification uh there is also a pretty obvious connection with violence here right the violence that these numbers exert right i can the first one is obviously on the hundreds of thousands of enslaved africans whose lives are here and those who uh perish right like in this calculation right as you we have to remember that uh at least between 30-40%, depending on how you count and depending on the years, of the people that were enslaved in Africa perished in their transportation to the Americas, both in the transportation within West and West Central Africa, but also in the Middle Passage and once they arrived to the Americas.

it is that violence that is also and the suffering that it is uh that that they wanted to make sure that that we understand it is also encapsulated in those numbers um and at the same time and they they as i said before that those at the inception of these ways of thinking we're going to be talking about this later i hope but uh this is one of many histories of that kind of larger genealogy of uh quantification as it relates to human bodies but it is one that it is crucial right like because i think when this is one of the arguments of the book is that the grammar the ways of understanding the possibilities for thinking about human bodies that emerge out of all this violence it is one that a state within it, rather within that logic of how is that we can somehow transport or move concepts of humanity, personhood, and make them calculable.

So that is the other thing.

They are very crude.

They are not in any way developed in the ways that we will see later on in the later 17th century or the 18th century.

But I do think that there is a certain conceptual basis that is already being developed here for the possibilities of, again, grouping and making sure that you can calculate the possibilities of survival, not only during the Middle Passage, but as I show in some of the later chapters in the book, survival in terms of years already working on mines or pearl fishing or plantations in America.

So there is a very direct correlation here between the measurement of the risk of people becoming sick and the production of these enterprises.

And they are part of how we imagine our bodies today, how our bodies are imagined, right? At the level of population, public health, thinking, demographic, et cetera, et cetera.

So first is that relationship between the blood relic and and quantification uh there is also a pretty obvious connection with violence here right the violence that these numbers exert right i can the first one is obviously on the hundreds of thousands of enslaved africans whose lives are here and those who uh perish right like in this calculation right we have to remember that uh at least between 30, 40%, depending on how you count and depending on the years, right, like of the people that were enslaved in Africa perished, right, like in their transportation to the Americas, both in the transportation within West and West Central Africa, but also in the Middle Passage and once they arrive into the Americas.

it is that violence that is also, and the suffering that it is, that I wanted to make sure that we understand it is also encapsulated in those numbers.

And at the same time, as I said before, at the inception of these ways of thinking, we're going to be talking about this later, I hope, but this is one of many histories of that kind of larger genealogy of quantification as it relates to human bodies but it is one that it is crucial right like because i think when this is one of the arguments of the book is that the grammar the ways of understanding the possibilities for thinking about human bodies that emerge out of all this violence it is one that a state within it, rather within that logic of how is that we can somehow transport or move concepts of humanity, personhood, and make them calculable.

In many ways, right, like all we see here is some of the earliest iterations of probabilistic thinking about human bodies.

Of course, the mathematics here or the animetics here are not in any way, they are very crude, they are not in any way develop in the ways that we will see later on in the later 17th century or the 18th century.

But I do think that there is a certain conceptual basis that is already being developed here for the possibilities of, again, grouping and making sure that you can calculate the possibilities of survival, not only during the Middle Passage, but as I show in some of the later chapters in the book, survival in terms of years already working on mines or pearl fishing or plantations in America.

So there is a very direct correlation here between the measurement of risk of people becoming sick and the production of these enterprises.

And they are part of how we imagine our bodies today, how our bodies are imagined, right, at the level of population, public health, thinking, demographic, et cetera, et cetera.

So first is that relationship between the blood relic and and quantification uh there is also a pretty obvious connection with violence here right the violence that these numbers exert right i can the first one is obviously on the hundreds of thousands of enslaved africans whose lives are here and those who uh perish right like in this calculation right as you we have to remember that uh at least between 30-40%, depending on how you count and depending on the years, of the people that were enslaved in Africa perished in their transportation to the Americas, both in the transportation within West and West Central Africa, but also in the Middle Passage and once they arrived to the Americas.

it is that violence that is also, and the suffering that it is, that I wanted to make sure that we understand it is also encapsulated in those numbers.

And at the same time, as I said before, at the inception of these ways of thinking, we're going to be talking about this later, I hope, but this is one of many histories of that kind of larger genealogy of quantification as it relates to human bodies but it is one that it is crucial right like because i think when this is one of the arguments of the book is that the grammar the ways of understanding the possibilities for thinking about human bodies that emerge out of all this violence it is one that a state within it, rather within that logic of how is that we can somehow transport or move concepts of humanity, personhood, and make them calculable.

In many ways, right, like all we see here is some of the earliest iterations of probabilistic thinking about human bodies.

Of course, the mathematics here or the animetics here are not in any way, they are very crude, they are not in any way develop in the ways that we will see later on in the later 17th century or the 18th century.

But I do think that there is a certain conceptual basis that is already being developed here for the possibilities of, again, grouping and making sure that you can calculate the possibilities of survival, not only during the Middle Passage, but as I show in some of the later chapters in the book, survival in terms of years already working on mines or pearl fishing or plantations in America.

So there is a very direct correlation here between the measurement of the risk of people becoming sick and the production of these enterprises.

years, right, like of

the people that were enslaved in Africa perish, right, like in their transportation to the Americas, both in the transportation within West and West Central Africa, but also in the Middle Passage and once they arrive into the Americas.

So, it is that violence that is also, and the suffering that it is, that I wanted to make sure that we understand it is also encapsulated in those numbers.

And at the same time, as I said before, at the inception of these ways of thinking, we're going to be talking about this later, I hope, but this is one of many histories of that kind of larger genealogy of quantification as it relates to human bodies but it is one that it is crucial right like because i think when this is one of the arguments of the book is that the grammar the ways of understanding the possibilities for thinking about human bodies that emerge out of all this violence it is one that a state within it, rather within that logic of how is that we can somehow transport or move concepts of humanity, personhood, and make them calculable.

In many ways, what we see here is some of the earliest iterations of probabilistic thinking about human bodies.

Of course, the mathematics here or the animetics here are not in any way, they are very crude, they are not in any way developed in the ways that we will see later on in the later 17th century or the 18th century.

But I do think that there is a certain conceptual basis that is already being developed here for the possibilities of, again, grouping and making sure that you can calculate the possibilities of survival, not only during the Middle Passage, but as I show in some of the later chapters in the book, survival in terms of years already working on mines or pearl fishing or plantations in America.

So there is a very direct correlation here between the measurement of risk of people becoming sick and the production of these enterprises.

And they're part of how we imagine our bodies today, how our bodies are imagined, right? At the level of population, public health, thinking, demographic, et cetera, et cetera.

So first is that relationship between the blood relic and and quantification uh there is also a pretty obvious connection with violence here right the violence that these numbers exert right i can the first one is obviously on the hundreds of thousands of enslaved africans whose lives are here and those who uh perish right like in this calculation right we have to remember that uh at least between 30-40%, depending on how you count and depending on the years, of the people that were enslaved in Africa perished in their transportation to the Americas, both in the transportation within West and West Central Africa, but also in the Middle Passage, and once they arrive into the Americas.

It is that violence that is also, and the suffering that it is, that I wanted to make sure that we understand it is also encapsulated in those numbers.

And at the same time, as I said before, at the inception of these ways of thinking, we're going to be talking about this later, I hope, but this is one of many histories of that kind of larger genealogy of quantification as it relates to human bodies, but it is one that it is crucial, right? Because I think this is one of the arguments of the book is that the grammar, the ways of understanding the possibilities for thinking about human bodies that emerge out of all this violence, it is one that a state within it, rather within that logic of how is that we can somehow transport or move concepts of humanity, personhood, and make them calculable.

In many ways, what we see here is some of the earliest iterations of probabilistic thinking about human bodies.

Of course, the mathematics here or the animetics here are not in any way, they are very crude, they are not in any way developed in the ways that we will see later on in the later 17th century or the 18th century.

But I do think that there is a certain conceptual basis that is already being developed here for the possibilities of, again, grouping and making sure that you can calculate the possibilities of survival, not only during the Middle Passage, but as I show in some of the later chapters in the book, survival in terms of years already working on mines or pearl fishing or plantations in America.

So there is a very direct correlation here between the measurement of risk of people becoming sick and the production of these enterprises.

I am a defender.

I am a protector, a custodian of various Afro-Diasporic spiritual traditions, some of those living lineages that survived the Middle Passage.

Traditions that, like so many of ours, has been deeply misrepresented.

They have been shunned, demonized, watered down, stripped of its dignity by people who never understood its depth.

And of course, there were many who went to the Caribbean as well.

But so- You know, of the 12 million people who were moved through the Middle Passage, only 400,000-ish came to the United States.

So already the odds are already against me being here.

But that small number means the odds are even slimmer.