Revisiting Terrestrial And Maritime Cultural Landscapes In Coastal Sierra Leone

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Maritime Archeology of the Slave Trade: Past and Present Work, and Future Prospects", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

This paper will assess the current state of the maritime and cultural landscapes of the region from a historical archaeological perspective and highlight their potential for present and future research. It centers on the spatial and material practices on Bunce Island and related trade sites in the Port Loko Creek, Rokel River, and the Sherbro River to understand the socio-political, economic, and cultural interactions between Europeans and the Indigenous population during the Atlantic period. With the popularization of DNA analysis, some African-Americans are tracing their roots to Sierra Leone and re-establishing ties with Sierra Leoneans through heritage tourism. This paper examines heritage tourism – an initiative called the "Path of Return" in Sierra Leone–as a critical tool for engaging the historic and contemporary conditions of African descent in our analysis of complex past landscapes, restorative social justice in the present, and a transformative future.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Maritime Archeology of the Slave Trade: Past and Present Work, and Future Prospects   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2023

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow