Historical Archaeology of Slavery

The practice of slavery goes back deep into Antiquity and is still found in some regions today. Its most extensive practice took place from 1450-1850 in the Age of Mercantile Capitalism and its legacy continues down to the present day.  Colonial era slavery involved the translocation of millions of people and its enormity has been compared with the European invasion of the Americas and the European Holocaust. Its vast literature covers aspects of anthropology, sociology, biology, demography, religious studies, women’s studies, economics, psychology and medicine. 
 
Historical archaeology - as defined in the US - covers the period 900-1850 AD when European nations expanded their maritime colonial empires to the New World, Africa and Asia. It includes the centuries during which plantation system produced the commodities on which the wealth of European nations was based. 
 
This course focusses on how historical archaeology contributes to the discourse of slavery. Archaeological excavations reveal how slaves were transshipped from their homelands, and how they lived in their new ones. It reconstructs the lives and death of slaves, where they lived, what they ate, what they made, and what they believed.  Archaeological finds are integrated with written sources to reveal the material signature of enslaved people, showing how slaves coped and how they reinvented themselves, materially and spiritually, in order to survive and flourish in foreign lands.