Aline Helg is a historian, specializing in the history of slavery. She is known for her research and books on the history of revolutions,

the Americas The Americas, which are sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North America, North and South America. The Americas make up most of the land in Earth's Western Hemisphere and comprise the New World. ...

, the

African diaspora The African diaspora is the worldwide collection of communities descended from native Africans or people from Africa, predominantly in the Americas. The term most commonly refers to the descendants of the West and Central Africans who were e ...

, civil rights, racism and

ethnicity An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...

Biography

At the age of six, Helg and her parents left Switzerland to live in the United States. There, she experienced life in a country with a language unknown to her. She returned to Switzerland to obtain her doctorate at the University of Geneva in 1983 and became a professor in the same institution in 2003. As

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

offered her few opportunities as a historian after her doctorate, she began her academic career in

America The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

working on Cuba, and

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

. She was interested in emancipation movements and the racial question, and focused on how people demonstrated resilience to build a dignified life. She subsequently taught at the Department of Political Science at University of Los Andes in

Bogotá Bogotá (, also , , ), officially Bogotá, Distrito Capital, abbreviated Bogotá, D.C., and formerly known as Santa Fe de Bogotá (; ) during the Spanish period and between 1991 and 2000, is the capital city of Colombia, and one of the larges ...

. She also taught at the Faculty of Psychology and

Education sciences Education sciences or education theory (traditionally often called ''pedagogy'') seek to describe, understand, and prescribe education policy and practice. Education sciences include many topics, such as pedagogy, andragogy, curriculum, learning, ...

and at the University Institute of Development Studies of the University of Geneva and at the History Department of the University of Texas at

Austin Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the seat and largest city of Travis County, with portions extending into Hays and Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the 11th-most-populous city ...

from 1989 to 2003.

History of slavery and revolutions

Aline Helg claims that the slave populations of the Americas did not wait for their freedom to be granted, rather they built autonomous emancipation strategies. Helg studied

slaves Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...

in South America who obtained their freedom even before of the abolition of slavery occurred. In her writing, she examines the means by which the enslaved became free and found that active

rebellion Rebellion, uprising, or insurrection is a refusal of obedience or order. It refers to the open resistance against the orders of an established authority. A rebellion originates from a sentiment of indignation and disapproval of a situation and ...

was not the most effective nor the most common form of emancipation. Browning (the flight towards the still unexplored American territories), emancipation through military conscription, the manumission participation, and integration of the slave point of view in the discourse on freedom are constitutive strategies developed gradually and a discreet resistance leading little by little towards the resumption of their

freedom Freedom is understood as either having the ability to act or change without constraint or to possess the power and resources to fulfill one's purposes unhindered. Freedom is often associated with liberty and autonomy in the sense of "giving on ...

s in a process called "encapacitation". This research questions a vision of the 1980s that insists on impressive revolts and which somehow coincide with a sort of Santo Domingo syndrome. Aline Helg also wrote articles for different publications such as "''Black Men, Racial Stereotyping, and Violence in the U.S. South and Cuba at the Turn of the Century''," published online by Comparative Studies in Society and History. Her book, ''Plus jamais esclave'' (''Slave No More''), tells the story of Francisque Fabulé in particular. Aline Helg regularly appears in the media as a specialist in the contemporary history of South America.

Book chapters

* Race in Argentina and Cuba, 1880 1930, Edited by Richard Graham, Published July 2010. * Race in Post-Abolition Afro-Latin America, with Kim Butler, pages 257 to 288

Awards

In 2016 she received the award of the "Académie romande" for her work ''Plus jamais esclave''.Une historienne genevoise autopsie l’esclavage aux Amériques
/ref> The book explores the liberation strategies adopted by the victims of slavery themselves in the Americas between 1492 and 1838.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Helg, Aline 1953 births Living people 21st-century Swiss historians Swiss women historians Historians of slavery Social historians Academic staff of the University of Geneva University of Geneva alumni 20th-century Swiss historians