How do I use the query box “Search for Africans” in the names database?
Information about the 67,000 liberated Africans in the Names database is organized in spreadsheet format in the main area of the page. Each African is assigned a unique identification number in the left-hand column. He or she is the basic unit of analysis, unlike the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database where the basic unit is a slave voyage. The search criteria (African name, ship name, voyage ID, time frame, age, etc.) correspond with headers for the spreadsheet. By selecting a variable, one can first observe how many of the liberated Africans shared a certain characteristic (the number appearing after “Results” – for example, 15,680 were boys) and then analyze variation within the variable – their distribution by age, height and origin, and their place of embarkation and disembarkation. Like the other databases of the website, this one permits the user to sort the values of any variable in clicking on its label, facilitating the detection and analysis of patterns.
