Georgianization

Structural oppositions in Deetz Medieval Culture Asymmetrical Corporate Labor of self Traditional Local Organic Georgian culture Balanced Individualized Labor of others Popular/Modern Global Ordered

Individualism ONE POT + ONE PLACE = ONE PERSON

Death’s Head “Here lies buried” Cherub “Here lies the body of” Urn and willow “In Memory of” Typical epitaphs Increasing abstraction: Common fate of death was re-symbolized first in a more pleasant afterlife and then in the recognition of the life lived

Order, Segregation, Secularism Individualism  Freedom freedom from traditional social relations

Beyond the people without history Moral mission: –to help the poor, powerless, and inarticulate Social Action: –Africans and African Americans as key players in the “formation and transformation of the black Atlantic world”

Ethnicity: self-conscious identity African –West African/Central African –Fon, Igbo, Kongo, Yoruba, etc. African American/Black “Oppressed ethnicity” Race and Racism

Class White over black –During and after slavery Internal class dynamics within African and African American communities –African elites and bourgeoisie –African American middle class

Gender? Very few studies of gender in African Diaspora archaeology Reflects persistence of moral mission

Interaction Acculturation –Simple replacement of African-derived items and practices with European/Euroamerican –Simplistic one-way reading of meaning Creolization –Interaction and exchange/agency in social and cultural form –Multidimensional and creative: “new” cultures –Segregated approach Power relations –Domination and resistance/agency in political form –Integrated approach

Material Culture How do objects produce history? Recursive: –objects act on makers and users Emblematic expressions of identity

Africa in America Most agree that “African Americans form a culturally distinct community with its own heritage” (Singleton p.8) At least in part a result of its African background How was this cultural identity constructed; –What were the sources? What were the contexts? What were the intentions? How do we answer these questions?

Atlantic African Slave Trade Trans-Atlantic exports by region Region Number of slaves accounted for % Senegambia479, Upper Guinea411, Windward Coast183, Gold Coast1,035, Blight of Benin2,016, Blight of Biafra1,463, West Central4,179, South East470, Total10,240,

Trans-Atlantic imports by region Region Number of slaves accounted for % Brazil4,000, Spanish Empire2,500, British West Indies2,000, French West Indies1,600, British North America and United States 500, Dutch West Indies500, Danish West Indies28, Europe (and Islands)200, Total11,328,

Revisionist School Placing Africans and their descendent at the center of their own histories Breaking with world systems/dependency theory which saw –Africa as passive agent in Euro-African interactions –Africans and Americans at a lower stage of development –saw the slave as powerless and established slavery as the principle source of explanation reduced the African identity of the slave Flattened African American identity to that of the slave

Thornton: Revisit Sources Atlantic trade was not essential to African well-being and development African economy was productive, diverse, and well- integrated Africans largely controlled the nature of their interactions with Europeans African trade, including the slave trade, was voluntary –Slavery was part of African societies and the Atlantic slave trade articulated with established practices

Early sites of Atlantic raid and trade Azores Madeira Cape Verde Islands

Major African trade routes

Prestige Depiction of the meeting between the Portuguese expedition and the Kongolese Royal Family