Abdul Sheriff – författare

The rise of Zanzibar was based on two major economic transformations. Firstly slaves became used for producing cloves and grains for export. Previously the slaves themselves were exported.Secondly, there was an increased international demand for luxuries such as ivory. At the same time the price of imported manufactured gods was falling. Zanzibar took advantage of its strategic position to trade as far as the Great Lakes.However this very economic success increasingly subordinated Zanzibar to Britain, with its anti-slavery crusade and its control over the Indian merchant class.Professor Sheriff analyses the early stages of the underdevelopment of East Africa and provides a corrective to the dominance of political and diplomatic factors in the history of the area.

The rise of Zanzibar was based on two major economic transformations. Firstly slaves became used for producing cloves and grains for export. Previously the slaves themselves were exported.Secondly, there was an increased international demand for luxuries such as ivory. At the same time the price of imported manufactured gods was falling. Zanzibar took advantage of its strategic position to trade as far as the Great Lakes.However this very economic success increasingly subordinated Zanzibar to Britain, with its anti-slavery crusade and its control over the Indian merchant class.Professor Sheriff analyses the early stages of the underdevelopment of East Africa and provides a corrective to the dominance of political and diplomatic factors in the history of the area.

Abdul Sheriff analyses the early stages of the underdevelopment of East Africa.The rise of Zanzibar was based on two major economic transformations: firstly, slaves became used for the production of cloves and grain for export, instead of the slaves themselves being exported; secondly there was an increaseddemand for luxuries such as ivory and Zanzibar took advantage of its strategic position to trade as far as the Great Lakes. Yet this economic success increasingly subordinated Zanzibar to Britain, with its anti-slavery crusade andits control over the Indian merchant class.North America: Ohio U Press; Kenya: EAEP

Follows on from the period covered in Abdul Sheriff's acclaimed Slaves, Spices and Ivory in Zanzibar.Zanzibar stands at the centre of the Indian Ocean system's involvement in the history of Eastern Africa. The first part of the book shows the transition of Zanzibar from the commercial economy of the nineteenth century to the colonial economy of the twentieth century. In the second part the authors analyse social classes and their role in the period culminating in the insurrection of 1964.North America: Ohio U Press; Tanzania: Historical Association of Tanzania

The wooden dhow, with its characteristic lateen sail, is an appropriate icon for the early trading world of the Indian Ocean. It was based on free trade unhindered by monopolies or superpower domination and pre-dated ‘globalisation’ by thousands of years. It carried a motley crew of sailors, traders and passengers, and many commodities, but the dhow was not merely an inanimate transporter of goods and people, but an animated means of social interaction. The dhow was at the mercy of the seasonal monsoons, but mercifully this very fact multiplied opportunities for social interaction between the sailors and traders with their hosts around the rim of the Indian Ocean, giving birth to cosmopolitan populations and cultures. The dhow was thus a vehicle for a genuine dialog between civilisations. The global world of the Indian Ocean had matured by the fifteenth century. Islam was the most widespread religion along its rim, but it had spread not by the sword but through peaceful commerce. The heroes of this world were not the continental empires but a string of small port city-states, from Kilwa in East Africa to Melaka in Malaysia. Nor was their influence confined to the littoral, but penetrated deep into continental hinterlands economically, socially and culturally. Into this world two major incursions occurred from opposite directions, the Chinese expeditions in the early fifteenth century and the Portuguese at the end of it. The contrast could not have been more stark between the Indian Ocean tradition of free trade that the Chinese espoused, despite their enormous strength, and the Vasco da Gama epoch of armed mercantilism that ultimately led to colonial domination. This sweeping and vividly written popular history of the dhow cultures contains dozens of color illustrations and many maps and is set to become the benchmark history of the early Indian Ocean.