This course is not currently offered, please contact the school or faculty of your program.

Course description

The trafficking of human bodies (both living and dead) in the 21st century is a global trade with a long history. Whether people were born into slavery or captured and sold into slavery, women, children and men become involuntary commodities traded worldwide. Spanning the ancient world through to the present, this interdisciplinary course examines the changing conditions in which bonded labour and slavery, that is hereditary bondage, can occur. We contextualize these practices through an investigation of the changing cultural, religious, philosophical, social and economic justifications over time that have been used both to defend, and abolish its existence. The course will focus on the following key themes: Slavery in the ancient world, Trafficking medieval relics, Philosophical attitudes against slavery, Reconciling religion and slavery (Muslim and Christian), Slave trading empires, Blackbirding and indentured labour in Queensland, Indigenous remains for museum collections, Slavery and the sex trade in South East Asia and Trafficking bodies in the 21st century.