Death, Race, and Childhood: An Examination of Toys as Grave Inclusions

Summary

During the Victorian Era, the concept of childhood followed a set of rules and values dictated by white upper and middle-class society. When the Industrial Revolution started around 1840, toys could be mass-produced, allowing larger quantities to be distributed among both urban and rural areas at a cheaper cost. This allowed a greater abundance of working-class African-American families to purchase toys for their children. Not only could they now afford toys, but since mortuary hardware was also being mass-produced, African-American families could afford elaborate funerals similar to the middle and upper class white families. An investigation of Freedman’s Cemetery (1869- 1907) in Dallas, Texas, along with an examination of 134 historic black and white cemeteries provide an archaeological context for the analysis of toy inclusions in children’s graves, which have the potential to understand how African-Americans navigated mortuary rules and values set by white middle and upper class society.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Giving the Dead a New Life: Cemeteries and Bioarchaeology   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2014

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): SYM-32,04