Blog Assignment #5

Think of any instance you can of the winners writing the history. What would the same history look like if the losers wrote the history?

Something sweet, something that many people like, and something that maybe we cannot be pleased to eat without. What do you think it is? The answer is sugar, white gold, according to British colonists.
Surprisingly, what we see and have in our daily lives, sugar, has a good example of the winners’ history. We often hear someone saying the major role of sugar when it comes to the modern capitalism. Sugar was considered as the most important of the overseas commodities that accounted for a third of Europe's entire economy. Sugar enabled some countries to accumulate their wealth. There was European sugar in the 15th century, but the quantities were small and it was hard to transport. Around that time, Columbus found America, the “New World”, and let sugar cane be planted to grow in the Caribbean. The history said this was the starting point of the “sweet” modern capitalism.
However, what this history omitted here is the losers’ point of view on this same subject. While winners said the beginning of marvelous industry took place at this point, it was an origin of long and painful slavery for Africans. They would describe this history a lot differently. Instead of emphasizing Europeans fine skills and their effects on modern society, Africans would focus on white people's immoral behaviors—trade slaves. Since sugar was not enough for the growing consumption, the early settlers realized they were lacking sufficient manpower to plant, harvest and process the crop. So what Columbus did was to open the slave trade to land into the Caribbean islands, where they cultivated and grew sugar taken from the American Indians. Eventually, the sugar became abundant and cheap. However, it was because of the white people's theft of America, from the American Indians. They stole the entire continent from the Indians. In short, the “losers” would describe the history of sugar as the beginning of the colonialism and slavery.
We should remember the history can be changed depending on the writers. Since the history is very subject, to observe historical events objectively, we need to at least compare two or more different historical documents written by different recorders. In this way, we will be able to come close to the historical truth.