To Move Forward We Must Look Back: The Slave Wrecks Project at 10 Years

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "To Move Forward We Must Look Back: The Slave Wrecks Project at 10 Years" at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The Slave Wrecks Project (SWP) is a collaboration between the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, the National Park Service, Diving With a Purpose, Iziko Museums of South Africa, Eduardo Mondlane University, the Society of Black Archaeologists, the University of the Virgin Islands, and other community partners that combines research and underwater and community-focused terrestrial archaeology with public engagement activities. These engagement activities include educational and training programs, museum exhibits, professional internships, and archival research. The SWP fosters public and scholarly understanding of the role of the African slave trade in shaping global history by using maritime and terrestrial archaeology as the vehicle for examining enslavement and its far-reaching global impacts, and the central role that this process played in constituting the modern world. Since 2010, our field efforts have been conducted both along the shores and under the waves in South Africa, Mozambique, Miami, Florida (Biscayne National Park), and St. Croix, US Virgin Islands. This symposium presents the results of SWP efforts to foster this understanding, engage local communities in uncovering and preserving their histories, and train local youth to build capacity in heritage management.