I've always considered the American Revolution a textbook example of a bougie revolution, in that a fuedal aristocrat's rule was overthrown by landowning capitalists not of the old fuedal nobility. IIRC Marx said something similar about it.
But last night a friend challenged that idea by pointing out that the fuedal base of society was de facto maintained via slavery, even if de jure there was no longer a king. In their interpretation, the war for independence wasn't actually a revolution, as the old divisions of nobility/serfs were maintained and simply rebranded along racial lines of white/Black, with indigenous peoples being considered almost completely outside the polity, similar to how many Jewish and Roma communities were regarded in Europe.
Thoughts?
Also wasn't sure if this went in history or askchapo
I prefer to call it the first creole revolution. That feels like a more charitable categorization. It’s not inaccurate to call it a bourgeoise revolution tho.
How so creole? As in, people who speak creole languages? Sorry, I'm just a bit confused by how you're using that term.
I think Creole was the Spanish term for Spanish settlers in overseas colonies (not counting Spanish territory in north Africa)
Ah, ok. That makes sense.
Creole in that the leaders of the revolution were descendants of colonizers, but were raised in the colony rather than the metropole. It’s a borrowed word from French. There is a similar word in Spanish. Likely in Portuguese as well, but I’m not sure. It also has a meaning in the field of linguistics, but that’s not how I’m using it.