West Africa (Geographic Keyword)

DOCUMENT Citation Only Megan Crutcher.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Maritime Archaeology in West Africa", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Finding direct evidence of West African mariners in early modern European sources is like following a trail of breadcrumbs. African labor was vital to regional and global commerce and culture, but is often obscured by European sources. One example is the Portuguese term "grumete,” which technically means a “cabin boy,” but was then...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Chrislyn Laurie Laurore. Matthew C. Reilly. Craig T. Stevens.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Critical Archaeologies of Whiteness", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Dozoa or Providence Island has long served as a meeting ground along the West African coast. Indigenous groups traded and potentially used the site for rites associated with secret societies. The site later served as a trading outpost, with European merchants eager to exchange goods, including human cargo. In this paper, we discuss recent...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Marissa G Triola.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Maritime Archaeology in West Africa", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Manillas and cowry shells served as alternative currencies in the trans-Atlantic trade in West Africa. Cowries are marine snails native to the Indian Ocean whose shells were brought into West Africa by trans-Saharan traders and adopted as an everyday alternative currency exchangeable for anything from food to slaves. Manillas are brass...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Lily R Singman-Aste.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Paper / Report Submission (General Sessions)", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The kingdom of Dahomey, active in what is now the republic of Bénin in seventeenth through nineteenth century West Africa, was a rich and complex society governed by a royal palace (Monroe 2014). In 2000, excavations that began at the kingdom’s royal palace complexes as a part of the Abomey Plateau Archaeological Project revealed a...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Clifford J Pereira.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "“Folkeliv” and Black Folks’ Lives: Archaeology, History, and Contemporary Black Atlantic Communities", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Today the Cape Verde islands are an independent country with a distinct culture encapsulated in the Kruolu/Kriol language. In the colonial past this culture extended to regions of coastal West Africa through a trading network whose reach was beyond that of Afro-European...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Liza Gijanto. Katherine Gill.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Boxed but not Forgotten Redux or: The Importance and Usefulness of Exploring Old or Forgotten Collections" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Within a half century of contact with the Americas, tobacco became a mainstay of West African life. Regional artisans began producing pipes giving rise to a new craft specialization. Archaeologists have created detailed typologies of these objects noting regional styles...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Oluseyi O. Agbelusi.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Global Archaeologies of the Long Emancipation", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. While many archaeological studies examine the impacts of the Atlantic slave trade on West African communities, archaeological research on tension for freedom in the region has been limited. No archaeological studies have analysed how anti-slavery or struggle for abolition set the stage for colonialism in the region. This paper...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Moussa Wele.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Maritime Archaeology in West Africa", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. There is a great wealth of UCH lying off Africa Atlantic coast and in the continent's inland waters, all speaking to the cultural identity of the coastal communities, but also witness to long history and the many maritime links to other parts of the world.In 2018 the UNESCO Regional Office in Dakar launched an initiative that articulates...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Matthew Reilly. Caree Banton. Craig Stevens. Chrislyn Laurore.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Global Archaeologies of the Long Emancipation", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The 2022 bicentennial of the arrival of Black Americans to West African shores was a moment of reflection for many Liberians. In the wake of civil war, many questioned the celebratory tone of the occasion and challenged settler heritage narratives. At the same time, Providence Island featured prominently in official programming,...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Megan Crutcher.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "UN Decade for Ocean Science's Heritage Network: Historical Archaeology's Contribution", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. In the last 20 years, Mississippi Street in Greenville, Liberia—once a thriving neighborhood—has been completely submerged in the Atlantic. At the current rate, by the end of the United Nations Ocean Decade in 2030, sea level will have risen over 30 millimeters. The world’s wealthiest...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Liza Gijanto.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Sal, Bacalhau e Açúcar : Trade, Mobility, Circular Navigation and Foodways in the Atlantic World", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. At the time of Portuguese arrival on the Gambia River (1446) the coastal polity of Niumi was a local source for salt for the interior and caravans coming to the coast. The region's entanglement in Atlantic commerce at various points between the 17th and 20th centuries lead to a...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Sean H. Reid. Oluseyi O. Agbelusi. Samuel Amartey. Francis M. Momoh.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Maritime Archeology of the Slave Trade: Past and Present Work, and Future Prospects", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. This paper will assess the current state of the maritime and cultural landscapes of the region from a historical archaeological perspective and highlight their potential for present and future research. It centers on the spatial and material practices on Bunce Island and related trade sites in...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kelly Goldberg.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Materialities of (Un)Freedom: Examining the Material Consequences of Inequality within Historical Archaeology", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Early 19th century legislation by European and American powers banning the forced exportation of enslaved Africans from the continent did not bring about an end to the transatlantic slave trade. Rather, it prompted traders to explore more secluded establishments and...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kelsey Rooney.

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Port of Call: Archaeologies of Labor and Movement through Ports", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. This presentation compares West African ports and their attendant infrastructure. As Atlantic trade intensified along the West African shore during the 17th and 18th centuries, Europeans relied heavily on local Africans for their seafaring knowledge and for their help in ferrying cargo and captives between ship...