Transformation of Racialized American Southern Heritage Landscapes Year 2 Annual Report: 2015-2016

Project Objective

The objective of this research is to contribute to the theorization of the transformation of racialized southern heritage landscapes within the . Specifically, the researchers examine the processes and politics of incorporating slavery into the built, narrative, and performative aspects of plantation landscapes as sites emblematic of contemporary struggles over the meanings and uses of southern and American heritage landscapes. Incorporating critical discussions of slavery at such sites not only enhances historical accuracy, but is also critical to understanding contemporary race relations in the United States. By and large, as a nation, we have yet to understand the key role that the history of slavery continues to have in developing the United States and the broader modern world. This research describes and explains the manner and extent to which southern tourist plantations are moving toward an incorporation of the history of slavery into the commemorative landscape of the region and nation. The factors motivating the incorporation of enslavement, and the important role that the built, narrative, and performative aspects of the plantation landscape play in narrating these traditionally marginalized histories, are the focus of this proposal.

Specific Project Goals

Typology of Change: Plantations and other types of southern racialized landscapes are changing. Moreover, each plantation engages with the topic of slavery in its own way. This project will produce typology of these changes to show how any single plantation, or other southern racialized heritage site, compares to others based on its current level of engagement with slavery.

Descriptive Model: this project will produce a descriptive model to visualize and represent the myriad and nuanced transformation of plantation landscapes and their built, narrative, and performative dimensions for narrating the past. In particular, this model represents the role and interaction of each of the three sets of actors—owners, docents and tourists— in co-production and co-consumption. Though these concepts are generally understood, how these actors and processes interact is unknown and therefore this model will make a unique and substantial contribution to the literature on the racialized southern heritage landscapes.

Theory Building: This project will produce theory for identifying and explaining the factors responsible for the growing willingness of some southern plantation sites to change their narration of antebellum history in ways that allows room for African-American belonging through the retelling of enslavement. Such theory also addresses the factors that limit or prevent this change. The theory developed through the proposed research will advance the literature not only on plantation landscapes but also the general literature on racialized southern heritage sites and ongoing work that addresses the geography of memory

Effecting Change in Plantation Museum Landscapes and Narratives: this project is part of a larger initiative called RESET (Race, Ethnicity, and Social Equity in Tourism). RESET challenges the marginalization of racial and ethnic groups, particularly African-Americans, within tourism development and conducts research that can assist in bringing greater social responsibility to the representation of minority interests and heritage at museums and other historic sites, including southern plantations.

Year One Accomplishments: Updated Summary of Activities As noted in the 2014-2015 annual project, the research team accomplished or made progress on all tasks found in the Project’s proposed timeline. The table below contains an updated summary those accomplishments.

Activity Status Hiring graduate and undergraduate research Completed, August 2014 assistants Creating research instruments Completed, December 2014 Obtaining IRB approval Completed, February 2015 Contacting owners of research sites Completed, February 2015 Data Collection at Louisiana sites Completed at 4 plantation and 1 counter- narrative site, March 2015. Completed at 1 local government owned plantation, June 2015 Begin conversations with GA-SC plantation Most visited plantations in GA-SC study area and counter narrative sites identified. Preliminary visits completed. Analysis of Louisiana Data Survey data downloaded and cleaned May 2015. Transcription of interview data begun in April 2015. Analysis of participant observation data begun in April 2015 Development of Project Webmap and UMW agrees to host site, August 2014 Website Development of geodatabase, May 2015 Presentation of initial results to Louisiana Completed, December 2016 Plantation Owners Presentation of Findings at AAG Meeting Alderman and Hanna presented initial findings at AAG in Chicago, April 2015 Begin Journal Manuscripts Initial abstracts of four journal articles prepared in April 2015 Progress towards fulfilling project goals Typology of Change: developed conceptualization of continuum from little/resistant to change to creation of new museum dedicated to slavery Descriptive Model: awaiting analysis of Year 2 data Theory Building: awaiting analysis of Year 2 data and collection of Year 3 data Effecting Change: presentation of data to owners, December 2015

Year Two Accomplishments: Specific Project Activities The research team has accomplished or made progress on all tasks included in the timeline found in Project’s initial proposal. Specifically: Activity Status Presentation of initial results to Louisiana Completed in December 2016 Plantation Owners Hiring new graduate and undergraduate Completed in Summer 2016. research assistants Contact owners/operators of SC-GA Access to Boone Hall, Drayton Hall, Magnolia plantation museums and counter-narrative site Plantation, McLeod Plantation, Middleton Place, and Old Slave Mart Museum secured in October, 2015. Transcription of Louisiana interviews (docent Completed in May 2016 and visitor) Analysis of Louisiana Visitor pre and post Descriptive stats generated: July 2015 surveys Cluster analysis completed: Sept. 2015 Paired t-tests of pre vs. post surveys: Feb 2016 Analysis of Louisiana interviews Ongoing Obtaining IRB approval for SC-GA fieldwork Completed in January 2016 to include Fieldwork as well. Initial conversations with owners of Access to , Bacon’s Castle, plantation and counter-narrative site in , Meadow Farm, and (James River) secured in March 2016. Black History Museum identified as possible counter-narrative site in May 2016 Data Collection at SC-GA sites Completed in February 2016 (management and docents) and April 2016 (visitors) Transcription of SC-GA interviews May 2016 – August 2016 Processing of SC-GA survey data April 2016 – July 2017 April Presentation of Additional Findings at AAG Hanna, Alderman, and Carter presented Meeting findings at AAG in San Francisco, April 2016. Presentation of initial results to SC-GA Scheduled for August 2016 Plantation Owners Complete and submit first Journal Seven articles published by Summer 2016. See Manuscripts Project Publications and Presentations section.

Additional Tasks: The project proposal calls for the creation of a website and web map to disseminate results upon the completion of the three year funded period. The GIS database created for the web map was updated in Fall 2015 and a beta-version of the web map was completed using ArcGIS online in March 2016. Progress Towards Fulfilling Project Goals: Data Collection: During the second year, the research team made minor changes to the research instruments (visitor pre-interview, visitor pre-survey, visitor post-interview, visitor post-survey, participant observation form, owner interview, and docent interview) and data collection methods to reflect lessons learned in Year One as well as differences between Charleston and River Road plantation museums. First, recognizing that conducting docent interviews at the same time visitors are surveyed and interview overwhelmed the research teams at some River Road sites, the docent and owner interviews were conducted in February 2016 while visitor interviews and surveys were completed in April 2016. Second, the research instruments were altered slightly to account for the Charleston plantations that run several different tours. Third, to increase the number of visitors who complete both the pre and post interviews or surveys as well to make it easier to match these completed surveys and interviews, we asked visitors completing the pre interview or survey to wear a sticker so that researchers could more easily identify them as they left the plantation. Finally, we interviewed more staff in management and curatorial positions than in River Road. These additional interviews were necessitated by the more complex nature of some of the sites. In June 2015, the team conducted visitor surveys and interviews and interviewed docents at Magnolia Mound Plantation in Baton Rouge. The owner/operator interview was completed in June 2016. This site represents the state or local government owned category not represented by the plantations covered in March 2015. At this site the team collected 9 visitor surveys, 6 visitor interviews, 1 guide interview, and one owner interview. This work increased the total N for River Road interactions to [1,035]. During Fieldwork in February we conducted 68 interviews with Charleston site owners, staff, and guides. In April we collected 76 visitor pre-tour interviews, 109 visitor post-tour interviews, 324 visitor pre-tour surveys, and 408 visitor post-tour surveys. In addition we used the participant observation instrument to document 57 tours of the five plantations in the study. Because the Old Slave Mart museum, the counter-narrative site, does not offer guided tours, no participant observation forms were completed for that site. Total N for all interactions in February and April is 1,040. Typology of Change: Data collection at the South Carolina plantations and counter-narrative museum familiarized the team with 6 sites to add to the 6 River Road plantations. Based on this experience the team began working on a multi-dimensional typology of change. Dimensions for the extent to which slavery in being incorporated into these plantations’ narratives, landscapes, and performances include, but are not limited to, the spatial dimension, affective/emotional dimension, audience dimension, material culture (artifacts, furnishings, etc) narrative dimension, and different business models of remembrance. Each dimension will have ordinal categories capturing the trajectory of how the enslaved are or are not becoming present at these sites. For example, the spatial dimension could run from plantations where the enslaved remain absent or are only represented by white-centric myths like the “faithful slave” to plantations where the plantation owners are displaced from the center of the plantation. This typology continues to be refined as data are analyzed. Descriptive Model: Once processed and analyzed, the data collected will produce a draft descriptive model to visualize and represent the role and interaction of each of the three sets of actors—owners/management, docents and tourists— in co-production and co-consumption. To date we have data from ten unique plantation sites and two counter narrative sites from which to draw, five from each of the two regions. Finding and accessing the top plantation sites and the counter narrative sites has taken time, but we have been successful in gaining the trust to collect the data on site. The larger challenge is finding the balance of the type of ownership models – private, foundation, state or local government owned, federally owned, not-for-profit – to create a balanced model and one that has robust representation of each ownership type since ownership types are not evenly distributed on the actual landscape with privately-held and family foundation owned plantations being the most pervasive in years one and two. Theory Building: As the draft typology of change and descriptive model are developed and interview and survey data are analyzed further, theory will be developed that will identify and explain the factors responsible for the growing willingness of some southern plantation sites to change their narration of antebellum history in ways that allows room for African-American belonging through the retelling of enslavement. The theory will also address the factors that limit or prevent this change. Building this theory will occur late in project as the large volume of data collected from the various narratives require analysis, absorption and then being able to contextualize these data into existing theories, discern where they do and do not fit well, and then further the theory by offering new insights and directions.

Effecting Change in Plantation Museum Landscapes and Narratives: In October and November 2015, the team supported a curator at one plantation who wanted to improve how that museum incorporated slavery into its tours and exhibits. To that end, a limited data analysis of visitor interviews was conducted to determine how many visitors would have liked to hear more about slavery. In addition, a preliminary summation of the data collected in Louisiana was presented to plantation owners and managers in December 2015. A similar presentation will be made to the Charleston owners and managers by August 2016. The expectations and reactions of visitors regarding the inclusion of slavery in plantation museum landscapes, narratives, and performances continues to be central to these presentations. Past experience suggests that this information helps convince some plantation owners and managers to maintain or increase the level of inclusion of enslaved African Americans in their representations of antebellum plantation life.

Impact on Principle Disciplines of the Project The conference presentations listed in the Project Publications and Presentations section generated much interest from audiences composed mostly of geographers. In addition, the articles published in the Journal of Heritage Tourism, an interdisciplinary journal, have begun to garner citations as measured by Google Scholar. Results shared in both publications and presentations continue to be preliminary and, therefore, it remains early to measure impacts on disciplines.

Changes in Project Methodology

Collecting Owner/Management/guide interview data Experience during Year 1 fieldwork proved the difficulty of conducting interviews of owners, guides, and other staff while also surveying and interviewing interviews. Therefore, these interviews conducted by team members and research assistants during two February trips to the Charleston research sites. In addition, the size and organizational complexity of several Charleston plantations necessitated interviewing mid-level curatorial and management staff to better grasp how owner/operator decisions are operationalized.

Sampling and Matching Visitors As in Louisiana, the team worked to conduct as many pre- and post-surveys as possible at each site in South Carolina. The transcription of Louisiana visitor interviews, however, suggests diminishing returns after 20 to 25 pre- or post-interviews at a single site. In Charleston, therefore, the research team focused on improving the qualitative depth of visitor interviews by limiting their number to approximately 20. The counter-narrative site, Charleston’s Old Slave Mart Museum, does not conduct guided-tours nor did it have a place where management would allow pre-surveys and interviews to be conducted. Therefore, only post interviews and surveys were collected. Finally, to increase the number of matched pre- and post- surveys and interviews, the team gave visitors who completed a pre-survey or interview a sticker to wear that helped us identify these visitors so we could complete post-surveys or interviews.

Impacts on the Virginia Study Area The changes in when owner/guide/management interviews will be conducted as well as changes in sampling and matching pre- and post- visitor surveys and interviews will be employed in the James River region as well. The team expects, however, to find significantly fewer total visitors in the Virginia sites and, therefore, will need to adjust techniques to increase the proportion of visitors who agree to participate.

Opportunities for training and professional development:

NSF funding for the project created the following opportunities for training and professional development: Research Associate: One research associate from The University of Southern Mississippi was invited onto the project having been a previous graduate student in years past with the data collection during the pilot stages. This research associate received extensive training in interview and survey methods over time and from which has been able to act more independently on the project compared to that of graduate and undergraduate students. The research associate was charged with organization of the data collection logistics as well as hand a hand in the organization of the data during transcription and analysis after the fieldwork data collection in South Carolina. The research associate’s experience has made her a full partner in the Project and she has produced independent research, either solo or with a co-author, for conference presentations and manuscripts for publication in journals and edited volumes.

Graduate Students: Seven graduate students from Armstrong State, University of Tennessee, Texas Tech University, and the University of Southern Mississippi received training in interview, survey, and participant observation methods. The fieldwork experience gained by the Texas Tech graduate student helped him prepare for thesis research involving interviewing residents of Midland, Texas, about how the fracking boom has impacted the city. The two masters-level students Southern Mississippi learned to transcribe interviews and were trained on research design as well. Two of the Ph.D. students at Tennessee furthered their research experience by preparing conference presentations and manuscripts for publication in journals and edited volumes. Participation in this project helped one of these land a tenure-track faculty position to teach historic preservation, public memory, and cultural landscapes a Ph.D. student at Tennessee, is a research assistant on the grant and received travel funding to support his dissertation on landscape, memory, and slavery. Finally, the NSF project greatly assisted in the recruitment of another student to Tennessee to study related issues.

Undergraduate Students: Nine undergraduate students from the University of Mary Washington, Armstrong State University, and the University of Norfolk received training in interview, survey, and participant observation methods. In addition, UMW students enhanced their GIS and web-mapping skills and were trained to transcribe interviews and introduced to qualitative data coding techniques. Several UMW and Armstrong State students gained presentation experience at regional conferences and/or campus events. Finally two UMW students and one UMW alumna (May 2015 graduate) acquired the manuscript preparation and editing skills required to publish a peer- reviewed article in an academic journal.

Dissemination of Results to Communities of Interest

Preliminary summations of the data collected in Louisiana were presented to plantation owners and managers in December 2015. A similar presentation will be made to South Carolina plantation owners and managers by August 2016.

In addition, media coverage related to the project includes:

Interview of Stephen Hanna about NSF funded research entitled, “Marking Stories of Slavery,” on With Good Reason, a radio program of the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities. (http://withgoodreasonradio.org/episode/marking-stories-of-slavery/)

Plans to Meet Project Goals in Year 3 Specific Project Activities In Year 3, the research team is scheduled to complete the following tasks included in the timeline found in Project’s initial proposal.

Activity Schedule for Completion Initial conversations with owners of Completed for plantations between October plantation and counter-narrative site in 2015 – February 2016 Virginia (James River) Identified possible counter-narrative site in May 2016 Obtaining IRB approval for James River Secured as part of IRB renewal, January 2016 fieldwork Hiring new graduate and undergraduate Recruitment of new research assistants at research assistants Armstrong State University, Norfolk State University, and the University of Mary Washington during Summer 2016 Interview Management and Guides at James July 2016 – December 2016 Transcription of James River Management September 2016 – January 2017 and Guide Interviews Data Collection at James River sites (visitor October 2016 surveys and interviews) Transcription of James River interviews November 2016 – March 2017 Processing of James River survey data November 2016 – January 2017 Presentation of Additional Findings at AAG April 2016 Meeting Presentation of initial results to James River January 2017 Plantation Owners Comparison of Results from all three regions November 2016 – February 2017 Preparation of typologies January 2017 – June 2017 Year 3 Publication Plans A journal article and a book chapter are under review or in revision. Other works in progress include a pedagogic piece on graduate/undergraduate field experiences; exploration of plantation images; spatial dimensions of representations of slavery; and more

Year 3 Plans for Fulfilling Project Goals: Data Collection: During the third year, interviews with guides and management at plantation and counter-narrative sites in the James River Region will begin in July 2016 and continue, as needed until January 2017. All visitor surveys and interviews as well as participant observation will occur in October 2016.

Typology of Change: The dimensions of this typology explored during the first two years will be adjusted following the final fieldwork and data collection in the James River region in October 2016.

Descriptive Model: A agglomeration of the data from the three regions will allow a final descriptive model to be created that will put context around the three regions and enable a larger view of the changing narratives of plantation museums

Theory Building: Current theories used by authors when writing about tourism plantations are inadequate whether they are from a tourism perspective or that of race. These data will support a furthering of the existing theories and/or provide the foundation necessary to explain the factors responsible for the growing willingness of some southern plantation sites to change their narration of antebellum history in ways that allows room for African- American belonging through the retelling of enslavement. The theory will also address the factors that limit or prevent this change. Such a foundation can then be tested and modified through future research at heritage tourism sites.

Effecting Change in Plantation Museum Landscapes and Narratives: As in Year 1 and Year 2, the results of data analysis will be shared on an ongoing basis with the James River plantations and counter-narrative site as well as with the Louisiana and Charleston area research sites. In addition, once complete, the knowledge produced through this project will enable a ability to type and place context around other tourism plantations within the United States and indicate where change can be effected at these sites fin order to make a social difference.

Project Publications and Presentations NSF funding provided resources that contributed to the following conference presentations and publications.

Presentations: Bright, Candace Forbes. “Plantation Tourism Supply and Demand: The Inclusion of and Desire for Slavery at South Louisiana Plantations.” Southeastern Division of the Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting, Pensacola, FL. November 2015. Carter, Perry. “Re-embodying the Enslaved: Southern Louisiana’s Whitney Plantation Museum,” Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting: San Francisco, California. April 2016. Caspersen, Janna and Derek H. Alderman. “Crowdsourcing the Memory of the Southern Plantation: Twitter as a Heritage Tourism Research Tool.” Annual Meeting of the American Association of Geographers, San Francisco, CA, April 2016. Cook, Matthew. “Dead labor: fetishizing chattel slavery in contemporary plantation museum.” Southeastern Division of the Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting, Pensacola, FL. November 2015 Gholston, Ashley. Undergraduate Research Panelist. Armstrong State University’s Student Scholars Symposium. April 2016. Hanna, Stephen and Derek Alderman. “From Celebratory Landscapes to Dark Tourism Sites? Exploring the Design of Southern Plantation Museums.” with Derek H. Alderman. Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting, San Francisco, California. April 2016 Hanna, Stephen. “Spatializing narratives of the enslaved at plantation museums.” Southeastern Division of the Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting, Pensacola, FL. November 2015 Potter, Amy. “She goes into character as the lady of the house”: Tour Guides, Performance and the Southern Plantation.” Lecture at the University of West Florida. November 2015. Potter, Amy. “She goes into character as the lady of the house”: Tour Guides, Performance and the Southern Plantation.” Robert I. Strozier Faculty Lecture. September 2015. Stone, Meredith, Ian Spangler, and Xavier Griffin, “Searching for the enslaved in the “Cradle of Democracy”: Spatializing Narratives of the Enslaved at Plantation Museums,” Southeastern Division of the Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting, Pensacola, FL. November 2015.

Publications: Alderman, Derek H., David L. Butler, and Stephen P. Hanna. 2016. “Memory, slavery, and plantation museums: the River Road Project,” Journal of Heritage Tourism 11(3): 209- 218. Alderman, Derek H., and E. Arnold Modlin Jr. 2016. “On the political utterances of plantation tourists: vocalizing the memory of slavery on River Road.” Journal of Heritage Tourism 11(3): 275-289. Bright, Candace F., Derek H. Alderman and David H. Butler. 2016. “Tourist Plantation Owners and Slavery: A Complex Relationship.” Current Issues in Tourism. DOI: 10.1080/13683500.2016.1190692 (online at http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13683500.2016.1190692) Bright, Candace F. and Perry L. Carter 2016. “Who are they?: visitors to Louisiana’s River Road plantations,” Journal of Heritage Tourism 11(3): 262-274. Carter, Perry L. 2016. “Where are the Enslaved?: TripAdvisor and the narrative landscapes of southern plantation museums,” Journal of Heritage Tourism 11(3): 235-249. Cook, Matthew 2016. “Counter-narratives of slavery in the Deep South: the politics of empathy along and beyond River Road,” Journal of Heritage Tourism 11(3): 290-308. Hanna, Stephen P. 2015. “Placing the enslaved at Oak Alley Plantation: narratives, spatial contexts, and the limits of surrogation,” Journal of Heritage Tourism 11(3): 219-234. Stone, Meredith, Ian Spangler, Xavier Griffin, and Stephen P. Hanna 2016. “Searching for the Enslaved in the “Cradle of Democracy”: Virginia’s James River plantation websites and the reproduction of local social memories,” Southeastern Geographer 56(2): 203-222.

Work in Progress: Carter, Perry L. and Candace Forbes Bright “Mapping Audiences to Museums: Visitors to three Southern Louisiana Plantation Museums,” Leisure Studies (under revision) Hanna, Stephen P. and Derek H. Alderman. “From celebratory landscapes to dark tourism sites? Exporting the design of southern plantation museums, in Palgrave Handbook of Dark Tourism Studies, P. Stone, R. Hartmann, T. Seaton, R. Sharpley, and L. White, editors. Palgrave-MacMillan (submitted).

Impact on Principal Disciplines of the Project

The conference presentations and publications listed above generated much interest from audiences comprised of Geographers, sociologists, historians, and museum professionals

Changes in Project Methodology Nothing to Report

Actual or Anticipated Problems or delays and actions or plans to resolve them Nothing to report