The Journal of African Diaspora Archaeology and Heritage (Taylor & Francis Press) includes open access articles. You can find these on the journal website (link). Examples of articles currently available with free access include:

"From Plantations to Military: Heritage of Galle Fort in Sri Lanka," by Shihan de Silva Jayasuriya. Abstract: Sri Lanka's position in the Indian Ocean trade led to the development of port cities. Galle fortress is a paradigm of coloniality, testifying to the interactions of the local and the global. While drawing attention to the Portuguese heritage, overshadowed by the Dutch and the British imprints, this paper also highlights the significance of Galle as an entrêpot for enslaved Africans. An early nineteenth-century manuscript in the British archives lists the names of enslaved Africans running away from the French in Diego Garcia. I argue that the heterogeneous names of the enslaved reveal multiple ethnicities of their owners and the complex world of plantations on which they laboured. Change in status from labourers to soldiers in the Ceylon Regiments typifies a wider demand for African military skills in the Indian subcontinent. The timing of the purchase of enslaved Africans, however, raises questions about the abolition of slavery in the Indian Ocean World. Keywords: Slavery, marronage, heritage, Sri Lanka, Diego Garcia, military, labour, abolition (article link).

"Valongo, the Place of the Ancestors: Spiritual Practices among Enslaved Africans in Nineteenth-century Rio de Janeiro," by Tania Andrade Lima. Abstract: In 2017, UNESCO added Valongo Wharf to its list of World Heritage Sites. Located in Rio de Janeiro's Port Zone, the wharf is a place of memory associated with the transatlantic slave trade, which has been compared to other sites that have witnessed intense human suffering, such as Auschwitz, Hiroshima and Gorée Island, among others. This chapter explores the spiritual practices of the "wretched of the Earth," as Frantz Fanon named those Africans dehumanized by European colonialism. More specifically, it focuses on the Africans shipped to Valongo to be sold as slaves in Rio de Janeiro and who left vestiges of their spiritual beliefs, recovered through archaeological research. Here, these remains are analyzed from a decolonial perspective, born from the reflections of critical Latin American thinkers who reject the diverse forms of domination and oppression inflicted by Northern hemisphere powers on subaltern populations of the global South. Keywords: Valongo Wharf, urban slavery, spiritual beliefs, decolonial thought, diasporic communities, historical archaeology, archaeology of the African diaspora, descendant communities (article link).

"Bioarchaeological Approaches to African Diasporas in the Twenty-First Century: Intercontinental and Global Legacies of Displacement," by Kristrina A. Shuler and Andreana S. Cunningham. Abstract: Bioarchaeological research offers a window into health and life experiences in the past, including the biocultural dimensions of social identities and structural inequalities experienced by enslaved and free Afro-descendants across the African diaspora. Given the long history of descendant communities and advocates contesting the authority of institutions to curate human remains in perpetuity, critical dialogues over the past several decades have stimulated new directions in the discipline of African diaspora bioarchaeology alongside increased engagement with Black scholarship and community and client-based collaborations. We build upon previous discussions and critiques to examine the current state of African diaspora bioarchaeology in global context in the early decades of the twenty-first century. We present a macro-level, chronological examination of published African diaspora and colonial African bioarchaeological research by region between 2001 and 2023 and conclude with a discussion of the current state of practices and engagement in the field and ethics of care. Keywords: African diaspora, Afro-descendants, slavery, emancipation, structural violence, bioarchaeology, human skeletal remains, ethics of care (article link).

"Renegotiating and Theorizing Heritage in the Context of 'Disaster' in the Caribbean: The Entanglement of Haitian Disaster-Related Histories," by Joseph Sony Jean and Jerry Michel. Abstract: This article examines how cultural heritage is negotiated in disaster contexts. One month after the earthquake on August 14, 2021 in Haiti, we surveyed damaged heritage sites and spoke with residents in the South and Grande-Anse departments about their experiences and perceptions. Via this research, we found a lack of disaster preparedness and few existing response mechanisms for managing cultural heritage amidst disaster. This article argues for more attention to heritage theory and practice in relation to disaster. It also shares concrete information about our research and its outcomes to create a dialogue between research needs and actual research results. Local voices are fundamental to the planning and decision-making necessary to sustain the future of Haiti's cultural heritage. Heritage studies in the Caribbean need to formulate and theorize more cogent critical questions about heritage – in particular, about how it is envisioned in urgent times. Keywords: Heritage studies, archaeological heritage, disaster, Caribbean, Haiti, coloniality, local voices, urgency (article link).

"Chatoyer's Punch Ladle: A Museum Artifact that Speaks to the Hidden History of the Garifuna, An African-Caribbean People," by Christina Welch and Niall Finneran. Abstract: This paper contextualizes the artifact "Punch Ladle, 1773" on display in the "London, Sugar & Slavery" exhibition at Museum of London Docklands (UK). A placard identifies the ladle as once belonging to "Chatoyer, Chief of the Caribs" and as on loan by the West India Committee. Through this artifact, the largely forgotten story of Chatoyer and the so-called Black Caribs (Garifuna) is highlighted, while complexities of the artifact's provenance are analyzed through an object biography approach. The paper also considers the ethical and curatorial implications of the current non-repatriation of the artifact and its present location within the "Slave Owner" part of the exhibition. Finally, by arguing for the artifact's global significance through its association with Chatoyer, a historic African-Caribbean figure of colonial resistance, this article contributes to current museum decolonization debates. Keywords: Object biography, repatriation, St. Vincent, African-Caribbean, Garifuna, Chatoyer, decolonization, curatorial space (article link).

The Restorative Justice in Heritage Studies and Archaeology book series, published by Routledge Press and edited by Richard Paul Benjamin (University of Liverpool), Christopher C. Fennell (University of Illinois), and Nedra K. Lee (University of Massachusetts), seeks proposals for single-author, multi-author, or edited books. Restorative justice in heritage and archaeology embraces initiatives for reconciliation of past societal transgressions using processes that are multivocal, dialogic, historically informed, community based, negotiated, and transformative. This series will present works that promote the active and often unconventional ways that archaeologists, historians, and heritage scholars are contributing to a process of remaking. Our authors work to define and illuminate the best practices for restorative justice in these fields and to identify how practitioners and their collaborators are working to redress, reconcile, and remake contemporary society.

Such restorative justice efforts typically focus on multiple perspectives and modes of reconciliation, rather than a narrow vision of retribution and punishment. Reparation initiatives are often multivocal, layered, multiplex, and visionary in this way. Restorative justice initiatives often occur through such a collaborative process which entails relationship building and story-telling, accountability and truth-telling, and reparative engagement.

Our first two volumes in the series are Grappling with Monuments of Oppression: Moving from Analysis to Activism (link) and Combating Oppression with New Commemorations (link).

Interested in proposing a book for this series? Contact one of us: Nedra.Lee@umb.edu, Richard.Benjamin@liverpool.ac.uk, or cfennell@illinois.edu.

General guidelines for authors are available from Routledge Press.

Follow this initiative through our website, and on Facebook.

In early 2019, Nicole Clare stumbled upon a dingy old auto repair shop for sale in the Inwood neighborhood at the northern tip of Manhattan. She had been looking for sites to build shelters for a homeless services nonprofit. The auto shop's lot fit the bill.

Situated next to an elevated train line, the property had seemed ordinary, with a big parking lot and a small building that could easily be razed. By that September, the down payment was in place, and the nonprofit was ready to move forward with design and construction.

But then Ms. Clare received a call about the site's dark history: Long before the auto shop, before skyscrapers dominated Manhattan's skyline and even before the subway was built, the site had been a burial ground for enslaved people.

In a city that's in a constant state of redevelopment, where every block has a past, what is the right thing to do with sites that have a grim back story?

In 1903, as the neighborhood was being developed, workers who were leveling 10th Avenue in Inwood unearthed roughly a dozen skeletons. About 40 percent of New York households had slaves in the early 18th century, and slavery wasn't abolished in the state until 1827.

When the nonprofit, the Bowery Residents' Committee, learned about the graveyard, it hit pause, unsure of what to do next. The Department of Homeless Services had uncovered the history during an environmental review of the site, at 3972 10th Avenue. "It was really a gut blow," said Ms. Clare, the nonprofit's head of real estate development.

She said the group couldn't "act or go on as normal." At the same time, she didn't want to walk away from the site entirely -- wouldn't someone else just buy it and build a McDonald's or a vape shop? Employees at the nonprofit spent months meeting with community members and descendants of slavery to figure out how to build the shelter in a way that respected the land’s history.

[Read the full article online at New York Times >>>].

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Society for Historical Archaeology
2026 Conference on Historical and Underwater Archaeology

January 7-10, 2026, Detroit, Michigan

"The SHA 2026 Conference Committee invites you to the 59th Conference on Historical and Underwater Archaeology in Detroit, Michigan, USA, from 7 to 10 January 2026. The 2026 SHA conference will be held at the Detroit Marriott at the Renaissance Center, located on the riverfront in downtown Detroit, just across the Detroit River from Windsor, Canada. The conference hotel's prime location provides direct access to public transportation and world-class restaurants, museums, architecture, cultural institutions, and archaeology that speak to the city's vibrant history of innovation, industry, and creativity."

Presentations and discussions related to African diaspora topics include:

Camp Nelson, Civil War Depot and Emancipation Center for Kentucky;
Unearthing Craft and Customs Embedded in Clay: The Archaeology of Locally Made Coarse Earthenwares;
Hearts in Transit: Emotional Journeys in Historical Archaeology;
Archaeologies of Black and Indigenous Sovereignty;
Unburying Black Towns: Archaeologies of Black Freedom, Erasure, and Mobility Across North America;
Archaeology in the Public Realm: A Decade of Work at the Harlem African Burial Ground;
Storied Landscapes: Co-Producing Meaningful Knowledge about Pasts, Presents, and Futures;
The Archaeology of the Black American Experience.

View the full conference program online.

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New Book

The Black Atlantic's Triple Burden:
Slavery, Colonialism, and Reparations
Edited by Adekeye Adebajo
Manchester University Press
564 pp., ISBN-13 978-1526193025, 2025.

Description from the Publisher:

This volume demonstrates the continuities of five centuries of European slavery and colonialism in Africa, the Caribbean, and the Americas, examining calls for reparations in all three regions for crimes against humanity. Authored by eminent scholars largely based in these areas, it contributes to transforming educational curricula globally. This collection is a comprehensive, multidisciplinary and enables cross-regional comparisons to be drawn, ensuring that important global events are read from diverse perspectives. The volume is aimed at subject area experts, as well as students in diverse areas of the humanities and beyond who seek a sound introductory reference book to these important historical subjects to which they are often not exposed. The authors thus represent a multi-disciplinary group encompassing diverse fields such as history, international relations, politics, economics, sociology, anthropology, literature, and languages. The book introduces readers to foreign-language historical sources-often inaccessible to an English-speaking audience-on these pivotal topics.

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New Book

Cross Marks in the African Diaspora:
A North American Perspective
By James M. Davidson
B.A.R. Ltd.
146 pp., ISBN-13 978-1407362533, 2025.

Description from the Publisher:

Since the 1970s, scholars working on African Diaspora archaeology have attempted to link material objects recovered from North American contexts to African parent cultures. One common symbol found on a variety of objects was the X or cross motif, sometimes placed within a circle. Originally recognized on colonoware in South Carolina, initial interpretations suggested that the symbol was derived from Ghana. However, after a series of publications by art historians documenting the Bakongo Culture of West Central Africa in the 1980s, subsequent archaeological interpretations shifted to assign this singular African culture and its underlying belief system as the exclusive origin for these symbolic expressions. This study contextualizes the religious belief systems and their manifested symbols throughout Africa and the British Isles and suggests several alternative African cultures as the source to explain the presence and meaning of the cross, and cross and circle, form within these New World contexts.

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New Book

Slavery's Medicine: Illness and
Labor in the British Plantation Caribbean
By Claire E. Gherini
University of Virginia Press
282 pp., ISBN-13 978-0813952758, 2025.

Description from the Publisher:

Healthcare and hierarchy in Caribbean plantation slavery -- From their inception, British Caribbean sugar plantations generated wealth on the basis of nightmarish systems of labor exploitation, where illness was a constant of enslaved life. Then, in the second half of the eighteenth century, plantation owners tried to "improve" plantation slavery, targeting medicine and healing. But rather than improve rates of illness, they sought instead to make the work of medicine and care more economically predictable and efficient and to hurry the sick back to work. Healthcare became an arena for contests for power, as people struggled with one another over the terms of their work and how they recovered from illness. Slavery's Medicine uses a rich and substantial archival base to document the experiences of the sick, managers, doctors, absentee plantation owners, enslaved healers, and medical advice authors in this new, modern system of body management. Modern medicine ultimately sustained hierarchies among enslaved people and middling whites. Yet modern medicine also encouraged acts of resistance. It was, therefore, the creation of proprietors as well as enslaved men and women themselves.

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New Book

Bioarchaeology in the Caribbean
Edited by Darlene Weston and Yadira Chinique de Armas
Routledge Press
368 pp., ISBN-13 978-1032193878, 2025.

Description from the Publisher:

Bioarchaeology in the Caribbean assembles leading and emerging scholars in Caribbean bioarchaeology, offering an overview of current research in genomic analyses, deathways, demography and health, diet and population mobility, and research ethics. Chapters emphasize the importance of culture in human adaptation and behavior at both population and individual levels. The first volume to focus solely on Caribbean bioarchaeology, this book is a landmark in this rapidly advancing area of scholarship, providing insight into current research methods and theoretical debates. The Caribbean region has a long and diverse history, and the chapters reflect this, discussing Indigenous, African and European colonial populations, temporally spanning the Archaic period, the Early and Late Ceramic periods, the time of first European contact, and the Colonial period. Bioarchaeology in the Caribbean will appeal to undergraduates, postgraduates, and researchers in bioarchaeology and Caribbean bioarchaeology and archaeology, in particular, as well as local stakeholders in the Caribbean (museum and archaeology professionals).

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Book Review

Alexandria Russell. Black Women Legacies: Public History Sites Seen and Unseen. University of Illinois Press, 2024. xii + 262 pp. (paper), ISBN 978-0-252-08836-0.

H-Net Book Review, published by H-Ethnic, https://networks.h-net.org/h-ethnic (June 2025).

Reviewed for H-Ethnic by Brande N. McCleese (Elizabeth City State University).

Chasing History

Alexandria Russell's Black Women Legacies arrives at a critical moment in American historiography when scholars are increasingly recognizing the need to center Black women's experiences in narratives of social change, intellectual development, and cultural transformation. This ambitious work seeks to trace the multifaceted legacies of Black women across generations, examining how their contributions have shaped American society while simultaneously being marginalized or erased from dominant historical narratives.

Russell, whose previous scholarship has focused on intersectional approaches to African American history, brings both methodological sophistication and passionate advocacy to this project. The book emerges from what she describes as a "genealogy of resistance," tracing connections between historical and contemporary Black women's activism, intellectual production, and cultural work. Her central argument posits that understanding Black women's legacies requires moving beyond individual biographical approaches to examine networks of influence, mentorship, and collective action that have sustained movements for social justice across centuries.

This book thoughtfully organizes themes rather than following a timeline, highlighting how particular strategies and issues remain relevant across different historical periods. It's truly fascinating! The opening chapters establish her theoretical framework, drawing heavily on Black feminist thought, particularly the work of Patricia Hill Collins, Kimberlé Crenshaw, and Audre Lorde. Russell argues convincingly that traditional approaches to legacy -- focused on individual achievement and formal institutional recognition -- fail to capture the ways Black women have created change through community building, cultural production, and what she terms "subversive domesticity."

Russell's treatment of the antebellum period through Reconstruction demonstrates her archival skills and theoretical sophistication. Her analysis of figures like Maria Stewart, Frances Harper, and lesser-known activists reveals how Black women developed distinctive rhetorical strategies that combined personal testimony with political critique. Particularly compelling is her discussion of how enslaved and free Black women created networks of support and resistance that transcended legal and social boundaries. Russell's use of previously unexplored correspondence and organizational records sheds light on the deliberate ways these women mentored younger activists and preserved institutional memory.

The book's middle sections, covering the late nineteenth through mid-twentieth centuries, showcase Russell's ability to connect individual biographies to broader social movements. Her treatment of figures like Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Mary Church Terrell, and Pauli Murray avoids hagiography while demonstrating how these women built upon earlier traditions of activism. Russell's examination of the club movement, anti-lynching campaigns, and early civil rights organizing reveals the clever and nuanced political strategies that were vital to these significant efforts. This insightful analysis exposes a level of sophistication often overlooked in narratives that predominantly feature male perspectives. By emphasizing these crucial contributions, Russell effectively underscores the profound impact women have had in shaping the civil rights landscape, reminding us of their indispensable role in the ongoing pursuit of equality and justice.

One of the book's greatest strengths is Russell's attention to cultural and intellectual legacies alongside political activism. Her chapters on writers, artists, and educators -- including Zora Neale Hurston, Augusta Savage, and Mary McLeod Bethune -- demonstrate how creative and educational work functioned as forms of resistance and community building. Russell's analysis of how these women created institutions, mentored protégés, and preserved cultural traditions provides essential context for understanding the flowering of Black cultural production in the midtwentieth century.

The final sections of the book, addressing the civil rights era through the present, reveal both the book's ambitions and its limitations. Russell's treatment of figures like Fannie Lou Hamer, Dorothy Height, and contemporary activists such as Alicia Garza offers valuable insights into the continuities and transformations in Black women's organizing. However, the scope of the material sometimes overwhelms the analytical framework. The discussion of contemporary movements, while informative, lacks the archival depth that characterizes the book's treatment of earlier periods.

Russell's methodology deserves particular attention. Her commitment to centering Black women's voices is evident in her extensive use of speeches, writings, and oral histories. She demonstrates impressive archival research, drawing on collections across the country to uncover previously overlooked materials. Her theoretical framework, grounded in Black feminist thought, provides coherent analytical threads throughout the work. However, her definition of "legacy" sometimes becomes so expansive as to lose analytical precision.

The book makes several significant contributions to multiple fields. For historians of African American women, Russell provides fresh interpretations of well-known figures while recovering lesser-known activists. Her attention to intergenerational networks and mentorship relationships offers new insights into how social movements sustain themselves over time. For scholars of social movements more broadly, the book demonstrates how attention to gender and race can reveal previously invisible forms of organizing and resistance.

Russell's writing is generally clear and accessible, making complex theoretical concepts understandable to nonspecialist readers. Her ability to weave together individual stories with broader analytical points creates an engaging narrative that serves both scholarly and pedagogical purposes. The book would be well suited for graduate courses on African American history, women's history, or social movements.

However, the book is not without limitations. The thematic organization, while effective in demonstrating continuities, sometimes obscures critical historical contexts and chronological developments. Russell's focus on nationally prominent figures, while understandable given space constraints, means that grassroots activists and local organizers receive less attention. The book would have benefited from more sustained engagement with recent scholarship on Black women's transnational connections and organizing.

Additionally, while Russell acknowledges class differences among Black women, her analysis could have engaged more fully with how economic factors shaped the ability of different women to create lasting legacies. The book's focus on heterosexual women also limits its engagement with queer Black women's contributions, though Russell does address this in her conclusion. Despite this omission, Black Women Legacies represents an essential contribution to American historiography. Russell's demonstration of how Black women created enduring institutions, mentored successive generations of activists, and preserved cultural traditions provides necessary context for understanding both historical and contemporary social movements. Her theoretical framework offers valuable tools for future scholars seeking to trace networks of influence and resistance.

The book's most significant achievement may be its demonstration of how individual agency and collective action intersect in the organizing of Black women. Russell convincingly demonstrates that understanding these women's legacies necessitates attention to both their achievements and their involvement in broader networks of mutual support and political action. This insight has implications that extend beyond African American history, offering new perspectives on how marginalized groups create change and sustain movements across generations.

Black Women Legacies should find its place on syllabi for courses in African American history, women's history, and social movements. It will be of particular value to scholars seeking to understand how attention to race and gender can transform our understanding of American political and cultural development. Russell has produced a work that honors its subjects while contributing to ongoing scholarly conversations about power, resistance, and social change.

[Citation: Brande N. McCleese. Review of Russell, Alexandria, Black Women Legacies: Public History Sites Seen and Unseen. H-Ethnic, H-Net Reviews. June, 2025. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. H-Net permits the redistribution and reprinting of this work for nonprofit, educational purposes.]

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