Madison Aubey

My project will consist of archaeological survey, excavation, and analysis in tandem with archival and oral historical work done in Africatown, Alabama. Founded by the survivors of the last slave ship to reach US shores– the Clotilda– Africatown provides a unique opportunity to better understand the processes by which Black folks in the post-Emancipation American South worked to assert their rightful identities, and preserved aspects of their heritage is the face of virulent social and structural oppression. Archaeologically, I will conduct excavations at the Lee (one of the founders of Africatown) homesite and perform comparative analyses between the materials recovered at the site and those from other contemporary free Black sites in the Southeastern US. Theoretically, this work will not only work to deconstruct the idea of a Black monolith identity but will also bring to light the ways in which Africatown’s members exercised legal freedom and affective forms of sovereignty– a concept which has yet to be realized in historical archaeology. Subsequently, I will put these archaeological materials into conversation with previously collected oral histories as well as other archival materials in order to further contextualize and name the affective sovereignty that defines the community’s origins and continued existence.