As últimas décadas da escravidão na Parahyba do Norte (1860-1910): escravizados, livres e o movimento abolicionista.

Abstract

This doctorate dissertation aims at understanding the process of disaggregration of slavery in Parahyba do Norte between 1860 and 1910. The use of new sources and approaches enabled the expansion of the time frame. Besides, it favored the insertion of the life experiences of the citizens involved in the social processes that contributed to the end of the slave system in such a place. Thus, because it is a multifaceted and complex subject, we understand the knowable object beyond its economic dimension, aiming at a broader understanding of the phenomenon. The location, Parahyba do Norte, reffers to a province composed by small and medium-sized properties with a low number of enslaved people together with a strong process of creolization due to the reproduction occurred among such individuals throughout its history. It is demonstrated the intersection of two complementary movements in the last three decades of the slave system: the first one was elaborated by enslaved people, their struggles and endurance actions; and the second one was run by free individuals, including their concerns related to a construction of antislavery institutions. It was carried out a theoretical and methodological dialogue with the social history of work in order to understand both enslaved and free workers, as well as the emancipationist projects advocated by the elite ruling of that location. By searching criminal proceedings, newspapers, provincial reports, police documents and other sources, it was possible to identify women and men, members of the lower classes, who struggled for better living conditions and certain autonomy in spite of the manorial power of the nineteenth-century society. The sharing of experiences among enslaved and free individuals revealed a deep and complex abolition, which is not limited to May 13, 1888. The freedom visions of free workers in the post-abolition suggest that the triumphant abolitionism did not ensure the necessary minimal conditions for them to overcome slavery.