[Review of] Elsa V. Goveia, A Study on the Historiography of the British West Indies, to the End of the Nineteenth Century

This is an extremely learned work. Published originally by the Pan American Institute of History and Geography in 1956 and recently reprinted in paperback by Howard Press, A Study on the Historiography of the British West Indies discusses almost seventy-five, often multi-volume works published between 1530 and 1898. This material includes works published in English, French, Spanish and Dutch. As the author points out, many of these volumes were originally composed by gifted amateurs who wrote with polemical purposes. The historiography of the British West Indies is a minefield of controversies about fundamental human questions which are exemplified in a distinctive locale