West Indies: References & Edit History
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Additional Reading
General histories include Franklin W. Knight, The Caribbean: The Genesis of a Fragmented Nationalism, 2nd ed. (1990); Jan Rogoziński, A Brief History of the Caribbean, rev. ed. (2000); and James Ferguson, The Story of the Caribbean People (1999). UNESCO, General History of the Caribbean, 6 vol. (1997– ), offers a comprehensive survey of the region’s history since pre-Columbian times.
Many histories of the region explore slavery and its origins and consequences: Carl Bridenbaugh and Roberta Bridenbaugh, No Peace Beyond the Line: The English in the Caribbean, 1624–1690 (1972); Richard S. Dunn, Sugar and Slaves: The Rise of the Planter Class in the English West Indies, 1624–1713 (1972, reissued with a new foreword 2000); Richard B. Sheridan, Sugar and Slavery: An Economic History of the British West Indies, 1623–1775 (1974, reissued 1994 with a new foreword); B.W. Higman, Slave Populations of the British Caribbean, 1807–1834 (1984, reissued 1995 with a new introduction); Michael Craton, Testing the Chains: Resistance to Slavery in the British West Indies (1982); William A. Green, British Slave Emancipation: The Sugar Colonies and the Great Experiment, 1830–1865 (1991); Manuel Moreno Fraginals, Frank Moya Pons, and Stanley L. Engerman (eds.), Between Slavery and Free Labor: The Spanish-Speaking Caribbean in the Nineteenth Century (1985); R.W. Beachey, The British West Indies Sugar Industry in the Late 19th Century (1957, reprinted 1978); and Malcolm Cross and Gad Heuman (eds.), Labour in the Caribbean: From Emancipation to Independence (1992). The rise of the postemancipation peasantry is explored in Sidney W. Mintz, Caribbean Transformations (1974, reissued 2007). A pathbreaking work relating to dependency is Eric Williams, Capitalism & Slavery (1944, reissued 1994 with a new introduction); and economic dependency on foreign countries is developed in Anthony Payne and Paul Sutton (eds.), Dependency Under Challenge: The Political Economy of the Commonwealth Caribbean (1984). The history of political and ideological conflict in the contemporary West Indies is told in Anthony Payne, The International Crisis in the Caribbean (1984); Paul Sutton, Dual Legacies in the Contemporary Caribbean: Continuing Aspects of British and French Dominion (1986); Robert D. Crassweller, The Caribbean Community: Changing Societies and U.S. Policy (1972); and Virginia R. Domínguez and Jorge I. Domínguez, The Caribbean: Its Implications for the United States (1981).
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Article History
| Type | Description | Contributor | Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Modified link of Web site: History World - History of the Caribbean (West Indies). | Jul 20, 2026 | ||
| Add new Web site: Official Tourism Site of Caribbean Island. | May 11, 2026 | ||
| Add new Web site: LOUIS Pressbooks - World Regional Geography - The Caribbean. | Oct 22, 2025 | ||
| Map replaced. | Sep 11, 2025 | ||
| Add new Web site: National Center for Biotechnology Information - PubMed Central - The West Indies as a laboratory of biogeography and evolution. | Jul 31, 2025 | ||
| Add new Web site: BMC Ecology and Evolution - Towards a synthesis of the Caribbean biogeography of terrestrial arthropods. | Jun 19, 2025 | ||
| Replaced map. | Apr 16, 2025 | ||
| Questions and answers added. | Mar 19, 2025 | ||
| Add new Web site: Country Studies - Caribbean Islands. | Aug 23, 2024 | ||
| Cross-references added. | Oct 25, 2023 | ||
| Add new Web site: History World - History of the Caribbean (West Indies). | Aug 16, 2022 | ||
| Media added. | Nov 09, 2020 | ||
| Media added. | Dec 13, 2018 | ||
| Media added. | Sep 06, 2017 | ||
| Add new Web site: Fact Monster - World - West Indies. | Sep 21, 2011 | ||
| Updated references to the Netherlands Antilles. | Oct 15, 2010 | ||
| "The Netherlands" changed to "the Netherlands." | Mar 12, 2010 | ||
| Changed "European Community" to "European Union." | Dec 29, 2009 | ||
| Changed "Virgin Islands of the United States" to "United States Virgin Islands." | Oct 22, 2009 | ||
| Added new Web site: National Geographic - Travel and Cultures - West Indies. | Apr 16, 2009 | ||
| Bibliography reviewed and updated. | Nov 10, 2008 | ||
| Article reviewed, reorganized, and updated. | Nov 10, 2008 | ||
| Added new Web site: How Stuff Works - Geography - West Indies. | Jul 11, 2008 | ||
| Added new Web site: Heritage History - Biography of Wendell Phillips. | Oct 09, 2006 | ||
| Added new Web site: Lonely Planet - Caribbean. | Jul 12, 2006 | ||
| Article revised. | Apr 17, 2003 | ||
| Article added to new online database. | Aug 24, 1998 |