A Small Place Lesson Plan

Why do Antiguans think of slavery as "a pageant full of large ships sailing on blue water...?"

Kincaid goes on to describe how Antiguans simultaneously think that slavery and its effects ended with "emancipation" and yet "emancipation" happened "just the other day." Her meaning here is not to imply that Antiguans were not scarred by slavery, or do not understand their own history, but that they do not put it what non-Antiguans might refer to as "historical context." In this way, Kincaid doesn't think her fellow Antiguans understand how much of their lives are still directly affected by slavery's legacy. For example: that a corrupt system in which people were mostly...