Instructing Reproduction in the British Caribbean 1780–1810

This essay investigates the discourse on reproduction in the British Caribbean in the late 18th and early 19th century from the larger perspective of plantation governance. By studying instructions for increased reproduction in three manuals for plantation management, I examine what practices the three authors suggest and what implications their different background have for their writings. The essay examines a wide array of practices connected to reproduction through a biopolitical framework. I argue that the variety of practices are to be understood as part of building a stable and healthy workforce for the sake of production and economic gain. My study shows how the diversity of practices underlines the complex power dynamics fundamental to the plantation system, where order is established through variety of actors ranging from legislators in England to the enslaved people themselves. Although the different authors have different political aims concerning slavery and abolition, they favour similar practices and arguments. By centering the genre of plantation management literature in the study of reproduction, I am able to extend earlier research regarding the politics of childbearing in the British Caribbean.