Landscapes of Labor: Uncovering Montserrat’s Post-Emancipation Lime Industry, 1852-1928

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Co-Producing Space: Relational Approaches to Agrarian Landscapes, Labor, Commodities, and Communities", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

This paper presents an historical archaeological analysis of Montserrat’s late 19th to early 20th-century citrus lime industry, which emerged in response to the demise of the sugar-based plantation economy on the Caribbean island. Following the networks of lime circulation, it addresses issues related to the control and distribution of resources, the movements of goods and people, and the colonial and capitalist processes which structured Montserratian life in the post-sugar era. Approaches previously employed in archaeological landscape studies and the anthropology of food aid in revealing the variety of agents, policies, and processes which intermingled within post-slavery Montserratian society and provided a catalyst for upending the colonial arrangements of class, race, and labor. This historical archaeological analysis serves as a case study for understanding the ways new Caribbean agro-industries impacted the lives of formerly enslaved island residents and changed the physical post-emancipation landscape.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2024   •
• Co-Producing Space: Relational Approaches to Agrarian Landscapes, Labor, Commodities, and Communities

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow