Antigua and Barbuda an Annotated Critical Bibliography
Antigua and Barbuda an annotated critical bibliography by Riva Berleant-Schiller and Susan Lowes, with Milton Benjamin Volume 182 of the World Bibliographical Series 1995 Clio Press ABC Clio, Ltd. (Oxford, England; Santa Barbara, California; Denver, Colorado) Abstract: Antigua and Barbuda, two islands of Leeward Island group in the eastern Caribbean, together make up a single independent state. The union is an uneasy one, for their relationship has always been ambiguous and their differences in history and economy greater than their similarities. Barbuda was forced unwillingly into the union and it is fair to say that Barbudan fears of subordination and exploitation under an Antiguan central government have been realized. Barbuda is a flat, dry limestone island. Its economy was never dominated by plantation agriculture. Instead, its inhabitants raised food and livestock for their own use and for provisioning the Antigua plantations of the island's lessees, the Codrington family. After the end of slavery, Barbudans resisted attempts to introduce commercial agriculture and stock-rearing on the island. They maintained a subsistence and small cash economy based on shifting cultivation, fishing, livestock, and charcoal-making, and carried it out under a commons system that gave equal rights to land to all Barbudans. Antigua, by contrast, was dominated by a sugar plantation economy that persisted after slave emancipation into the twentieth century. Its economy and goals are now shaped by the kind of high-impact tourism development that includes gambling casinos and luxury hotels. The Antiguan government values Barbuda primarily for its sparsely populated lands and comparatively empty beaches. This bibliography is the only comprehensive reference book available for locating information about Antigua and Barbuda.
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