Assumed Identities: The Meanings of Race in the Atlantic World

Preface and Acknowledgments

ix I dentity is a slippery concept. Everyone knows it exists. Everyone has it. But what is it? And—a question of special importance for historians—how does one document its existence? It presents a moving and shadowy target, always transforming, never fixed, never just one thing. As an object, it is seen differently depending on the subject’s vantage point. Put another way, identity exists both as an object and as something subjectively understood within historical context, that is, within a social and political universe that moves through time. Identity is assumed. Each of the essays in this volume assumes at least three identities: one taken by the subject, one given the subject by his or her contemporaries, one given to all by the historian. In the first and last essays, the subjects are individuals: Ogé and Rosalie. They bookend essays on groups and group identities: British West Indian planters, Chesapeake Anglicans, Africans in Brazil. Whether individual or group, the subjects of these essays, however they saw themselves and however they were seen by others, are assumed by the authors to have had racial identities forged within the early modern Atlantic world. That point is expressed in the volume’s subtitle and discussed in the introduction. The essays originated as lectures given during the  Annual Webb Lectures, presented by the University of Texas at Arlington Department of History and, on this occasion, by the History Department’s Graduate Program in Trans-Atlantic History. Trans-Atlantic history, which assumes a trans-Atlantic community and identity and projects it upon the past, has institutionalized an identity for our graduate program. The Trans-Atlantic field itself has been a way for scholars to escape some of the limits imposed by national histories. Yet with the election of Barack Obama, national conPreface and Acknowledgments x P R E FA C E A N D A C K N O W L E D G M E N T S versations on identity are not so centered on the Atlantic as they once were, reminding us once again of the transitory nature of identity. The son of a black Kenyan and white Kansan, born in Hawaii and raised there as well as in Indonesia, Obama has an assumed identity, including his racial identity, that is surely more closely tied to the Pacific Ocean, even as he is assumed by some to be a more typical African American, from Southside Chicago, no less, an identity with roots in the nation’s trans-Atlantic past and one that Obama himself in certain contexts seems to embrace. But we need go no further than our own campus to witness the complex and transitory nature of identity.Within a mere decade or two the university has changed from a commuter campus, with a student body predominantly from the white suburbs and small towns around Dallas and Fort Worth, into a more residential university with a student body recently placed among the top  percent of national universities ranked according to racial diversity. For the Asians and Pacific Islanders, many of the Hispanics who trace their ancestry south to Mexico and Central and South America, and no doubt for others as well, the Atlantic Ocean does not figure into their identity, except to the extent that they, like President Obama, embrace an American identity that remains trans-Atlantic. In those moments, the historical identities explored in this volume are theirs too. We would like to acknowledge several benefactors and friends of the Webb Lecture . C. B. Smith Sr., an Austin businessman and former student of Walter Prescott Webb, generously provided the original endowment that makes possible the annual presentation and publication of the lectures. Over the years the endowment has bene fited from the additional support of Jenkins and Virginia Garrett of Fort Worth. President Robert Spaniolo supported our efforts by generously providing a reception in honor of the lectures, and providing additional support for publication costs from Rudolph Hermann’s Endowment for the Liberal Arts. We also thank Beth Wright, dean of the College of Liberal Arts for supporting the cost of illustrations for this volume. Other thanks go to Bob Fairbanks, chair of the Department of History; Don Kyle, outgoing chair of the Department of History; Joyce Goldberg, chair of the Webb Lectures Committee; and our colleagues in History and elsewhere around campus who annually support the lectures. ASSUMED IDENTITIES ...