About Me
Welcome! My name is Avery Olson, and I am a public relations student
at the University of Oregon. I’m currently taking ENG470: Tech and Texts Capstone to fulfill a requirement for my Digital Humanities minor. In that class, I, alongside my peers and professor, am researching the Morant Bay Rebellion, a historical event that often seems to go unmentioned. More specifically, my classmates and I will be focusing on the women of the rebellion by reading, transcribing and visualizing their written testimonies. By undergoing this process of completing this project, I hope to gain a better understanding of the roles specific women played in this rebellion, as well as in 19th century Jamaican society as a whole.
What is the Morant Bay Rebellion?
The Morant Bay Rebellion took place in October 1865 in Jamaica. It was a culmination of the poor conditions in Jamaica for the years leading up to the rebellion, but was a direct result of the attempted arrest of Paul Bogle, a recognized community leader in Stony Gut, Jamaica. Following news of his arrest, an armed group of rebels stormed the Court House in support of Bogle. Violence ensued for three days, with numerous lives lost and houses burnt down. Following the rebellion, the British-born Jamaican governer John Eyre declared a state of martial law in Jamaica for 30 days. That period of martial law was ruthless and left hundreds of Jamaican citizens flogged, executed or imprisoned.