"What Color was Your Papa’s Coat of Arms, Again?" How a Central Valley Californian Community Remembers its ‘Post-War’ Landscape

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Historical Memory, Archaeology, And The Social Experience Of Conflict and Battlefields" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

This paper moves away from the typical idea of “war” as a physical armed conflict or confrontation, but rather any physical manner or manifestation of modern-day conflict. I propose that the playing out of a racialized environmental-based conflict between the all-black town of Allensworth, California and the greater (majority white) external forces controlling land, water, and agriculture, rightfully also earns the classification as a war. The Central Valley town was home to a number of Buffalo Soldier regiments, their families, and civilians alike upon its founding in 1908 by Lieutenant Colonel Allen Allensworth. Through an analysis of material culture and historic archival data, this paper will examine the complex relationship between systematic forms of oppression and cultural-environmental agency, while addressing the question of how contemporary black communities justify, negotiate, and commemorate the Buffalo Soldiers’ role within a national narrative.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2020   •
• Historical Memory, Archaeology, And The Social Experience Of Conflict and Battlefields

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Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 118