Pourquoi naître esclave (Why born a slave) is the name given by sculptor and painter Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux (1827-1875) to a series of busts he created around 1870. While he was working on the representation of Africa, he came up with the idea of the bust of the Négresse Captive.

Obsessed with faithful representations of human movement, he sculpted his slave at an angle in order to express revolt.