The Comparative Histories of Slavery in Brazil, Cuba, and the United States

Laird W. Bergad was born and raised in Pittsburgh. He attended the University of Wisconsin, where he received his B.A. in history in 1970. He then lived and worked in various jobs in Puerto Rico before enrolling in graduate school at the University of Pittsburgh, where he received his Ph.D. degree in Latin American and Caribbean history in 1980. He has traveled widely through Latin America and has lived for extended periods in Cuba and Brazil. He has written and published four previous books about rural slave-based societies during the 18th and 19th centuries in Puerto Rico, Cuba, and Brazil: Coffee and the Growth of Agarian Capitalism in Puerto Rico (1983), Cuban Rural Society in the 19th Century (1990), The Cuban Slave Market, 1790-1880 (coauthored) (Cambridge University Press, 1995); Slavery and the Demographic and Economic History of Minas Gerais, Brazil, 1720-1888 (Cambridge University Press, 1999). He has been the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, two Fulbright Fellowships, and an NEH Fellowship, among other grants and honors. He is the founding director of the City University of New York's Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies.