Little Giants of the Seas: Situated Globalities on the Small Islands of the Venezuelan Caribbean, 1638-1880

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "In Small Islands Forgotten: Insular Historical Archaeologies of a Globalizing World", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

The Venezuelan Caribbean, while being an expansive and influential space, has been an understudied region, underrepresented within Caribbean and Atlantic-world historiography. Various small islands in the long chain of archipelagoes and insular territories that dot this maritime region — including La Tortuga, Cayo Sal (Los Roques Archipelago), and Klein Bonaire — were places for foreign seafarers to obtain key commodities such as salt, lime, and sea turtles as well as transshipment points for smuggling valuable commodities from Venezuelan Tierra Firme, including cacao, hides, tobacco, and mules. Archaeological and documentary evidence reveals that the unique mobilities potential offered by the sea made the temporary campsites at these islands places where the often exotic and global became intimately nested in the everyday and local, giving rise to situated globalities. The oceanic highways and the people who busily sailed upon them made of these seemingly isolated and forgotten small islands little giants of the seas.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• In Small Islands Forgotten: Insular Historical Archaeologies of a Globalizing World   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2023

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow