Imperial Anomaly: Historians in the British Caribbean

Recent works on the British Caribbean have finally confronted slavery as a fundamental factor shaping that region.  Earlier works tended to overlook slavery in order to pursue a host of other matters: piracy, contraband trade, political development, military encounters.  Meanwhile scholars of other parts of the first British Empire equated the British Caribbean with slavery, treating it as an anomalous counter example to the historical trends on the North American mainland. In a strangely bifurcated situation, the West Indies were about slavery for those on the outside but the history of the region was until recently often explored without confronting the reality of slavery.