Formerly enslaved people in Guyana embraced collective action | Letter

We should learn about emancipated people’s extraordinary capacity for mutual endeavour, writes Prof Kathryn A Monk, in response to an article in the Cotton Capital series Your report (British corporation continued trafficking of enslaved Africans to Guyana 40 years after abolition, 23 August) tells one important part of Guyana’s post-slavery history. There is another that deserves to be better known.In 1839, little more than a year after full emancipation in British Guiana, 83 formerly enslaved men and women pooled their savings to buy the 200-hectare (500-acre) Northbrook plantation. They renamed it Victoria. Other purchases by other groups followed, developing into what became known as the communal African village movement. Continue reading...