Ricardo Márquez García, M.A.

Asymmetrical Dependencies in Life Stories from the Cameroon Grassfields, 1850 – 1950

The Cameroon Grassfields, located in the West Region (hinterland) of the country, were in pre-colonial times a considerable supplier of enslaved people for different Atlantic ports and a minor supplier for the Sahara trade (until c. 1889). The predominantly centralized societies of the Grassfields enslaved people mostly by trading and without raids. After the official abolition of the Transatlantic Slave Trade the Grassfields continued supplying people, no longer for the Atlantic ports but for African and European plantations in the coastal regions of Cameroon and Nigeria (c. 1889-1930). Depending on the perspective taken, these two phenomena can be considered as independent from each other (Transatlantic Slave Trade vs. colonial recruitment) or as two periods in the long history of human trafficking in the Grassfields. By identifying the voices (stories) of the enslaved people and taking a regional perspective, this research project aims at highlighting the strong continuities between these two phenomena instead of disconnecting them due to methodological and pragmatic issues. A third, and not less important phase in this history of asymmetrical dependencies in the Grassfields is also taken into account: the regional mobilisation of labourers for the cultivation of coffee led by the former suppliers of 'slaves' and 'forced workers' (c.1930-1950).

since 2021        
PhD in History, University of Bonn, Germany

2011–2014         
M.A. in Interdisciplinary Latin American Studies, Free University of Berlin, Germany

2007–2011         
B.A. in Foreign Language Didactics and Sociology, Bielefeld University, Germany

2021–2024         
Research Associate in Research Group The Concept of Slavery in African History, University of Bonn, Germany

2014–2015         
DAAD Language Assistant, Université de Yaoundé I, Cameroon

2010–2012        
Student Assistant, Bielefeld University, Germany