Colonialism and Slavery: An Alternative History of the Port City of Rotterdam
Colonialism and Slavery: An Alternative History of the Port City of Rotterdam
edited by Gert Oostindie
Leiden University Press, 2021 Paper: 978-90-8728-370-4 | eISBN: 978-94-006-0422-3
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | TOC
ABOUT THIS BOOK
Unlike most city histories, this book focuses exclusively on the city’s connections with colonialism and slavery. Rotterdam, the second-largest Dutch city, is one of Europe’s leading ports. Its maritime expansion was intrinsically linked to Dutch colonialism, including slave trading and colonial slavery in the Americas, Africa and Asia. This painful history sits uneasily with the city’s modern cosmopolitan image and its large population of ‘new Rotterdammers’ with colonial roots. The present volume provides a summary of the research that has documented this history, with chapters on the contribution of colonial trade to economic development; the city’s involvement in slavery; the role of the urban political elites; the impact on urban development and architecture; the ‘ethical impulse’; colonial art and ethnographic collections; colonial and postcolonial migration; and finally the resonance of this history in postcolonial Rotterdam.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Gert Oostindie is Director of the KITLV/Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies in Leiden, and Professor of Colonial and Postcolonial History at Leiden University. He has published widely on slavery, colonialism, decolonization, postcolonial migration and the relevance of the colonial past for contemporary society.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
I Colonial and Postcolonial Rotterdam Gert Oostindie
II Rotterdam’s Colonial Connections. Shipping and Trade, Industry and Finance Gerhard de Kok
III Rotterdam and Transatlantic Slavery Alex van Stipriaan
IV Civic Government and Businessmen in Rotterdam: Colonial Cross-fertilization Henk den Heijer V More than Meets the Eye. Traces of a Colonial Past in the City of Rotterdam Pauline K.M. van Roosmalen
VI Colonial Rotterdam: a Hotbed for Dutch Missionary Work, 1797-1977 Tom van den Berge
VII A Never-ending Story. Colonial Collections in Rotterdam Alexandra van Dongen and Liane van der Linden
VIII Making a Home in Rotterdam. Colonial and Postcolonial Migrants To and From the City Esther Captain
IX The Road is Mine. The Summer Carnival as a Case Study for Postcolonial Rotterdam Francio Guadeloupe, Paul van de Laar & Liane van der Linden