Constructing A Community Of Color: A Spatial Analysis Of New Guinea On Nantucket

Author(s): Jared P Muehlbauer

Year: 2018

Summary

In 1827, the community of New Guinea on Nantucket, MA opened the doors of the African Meeting House.  The African Meeting House’s construction was a milestone event in the establishment of this thriving community of color.  People of African and Native ancestry on Nantucket coupled this with buying property, building homes, starting businesses, and founding institutions to create a space that allowed them refuge from daily experiences of racism, and facilitated community resistance. By examining the spatial layout of New Guinea through the 19th century, I investigate how people of African and Native ancestry on Nantucket utilized space as an important tool of cultural persistence in a society invested in preserving white hegemony.  Investigating community spaces also provides opportunities to use heritage to combat racial inequality in the present.  This paper will briefly examine how an understanding of space provides archaeologists with tools to challenge the erasure of black histories. 

Cite this Record

Constructing A Community Of Color: A Spatial Analysis Of New Guinea On Nantucket. Jared P Muehlbauer. Presented at Society for Historical Archaeology, New Orleans, Louisiana. 2018 ( tDAR id: 441572)

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Keywords

General
heritage Race Space

Geographic Keywords
North America United States of America

Temporal Keywords
19th Century

Spatial Coverage

min long: -129.199; min lat: 24.495 ; max long: -66.973; max lat: 49.359 ;

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 1061