The Focus of Analysis

Abstract

To examine how global historical processes were affecting change in a localized region, and how spatial manipulations were integrated into such change, the remaining chapters of this book examine the negotiation of space in the Blue Mountains of Jamaica. This chapter serves as an introduction to the area chosen as the focus of that regional analysis by outlining the structure of Jamaican plantation society and the general history of coffee production in the Yallahs River drainage, concentrating specifically on the individual plantations incorporated into this study. The Yallahs River drainage of eastern Jamaica was chosen as the project study area for several reasons. First, because the coffee plantation complex of this region was first established during the period of crisis outlined in earlier chapters, tracing the spatial transformations that occurred in this region allows me to consider how planters were adapting to the climate of crisis that affected Jamaica throughout the first half of the nineteenth century. Second, ample cartographic, documentary, and archaeological records exist to provide sufficient data for such an analysis of the Yallahs region.

I consider my district, the parish of St. David, to be in a state of tranquility. The coffee crop here, which is of considerable extent, is nearly saved: it has been got in with much satisfaction; the quantity picked per day by each person employed, when the coffee was fully ripe, being equal to that ever required.

— Patrick Dunne, stipendiary magistrate, 1835