Slavery: acquired or ascribed status?

Abstract

Without Slavery as an institution the status of a “slave” would have been nonexistent. But slavery is an institution in which no sane person would patronise willingly. Yet, some individuals have found themselves perpetually subject to it generation after generation. This group of individuals, no matter how hard they try, continue to move from one form of slavery to the other. While some people are removed from slavery to leadership positions like Robert Small and Joseph in the bible, others remain perpetually tied to the institution no matter the level of violence, revolt, and destruction instituted by them to terminate their membership of that institution. The resilience and complications in this institution are made worse by some cultures which have made the status of the slave hereditary. As such, tongues have continued to wag, scholars have continued to criticize, and Philosophers have engaged in endless debates on the inhuman conditions surrounding this ignoble institution in order to end it with little or no success. Others interested in the subject have consistently debated the issue along ethical or religious lines. This research, using the interdisciplinary approaches, interrogates this effusive subject matter purely from the academic point of view. The paper relied on secondary and internet sources to arrive at the conclusion that rugged and resilient as the institution may appear, it is not beyond eradicating given the right conditions and attitudes.