Museums and Cultural Heritage Program (MUCH)

The Department of Anthropology is active in the Museums and Cultural Heritage Program at Rice, and several projects associated with the practicum requirement of the program have engaged in cultural heritage at Texas historical sites.

ANTH Major Phoenix Orta creates Digital Cultural Heritage Map using ArchGIS

https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/7cbd1b6875454688b0f4f0d1a40f2f99

This StoryMap was created by Rice University undergraduate student Phoenix Orta with the collaboration and advice of Molly Morgan, Fares El-Dahdah, Angela Pfeiffer, and Uilvim Franco. This project designing a story map of Varner-Hogg Plantation aims to present the many layers of history at Varner-Hogg Plantation into an accessible and engaging digital format. Particularly, this project was created with the goal of educating about the history of slavery and African-American heritage on this plantation by integrating various forms of data into a cohesive narrative about these individuals and their lives. Many of the images presented in this StoryMap will also be included in Dr. El-Dadah’s larger StoryMap project called Black Life in Houston: An Atlas of Racial Inequality, Displacement, and Integration. To explore all of the georeferenced photographs and sketches collected for this project, visit our Varner-Hogg Plantation Image Gallery . To explore even more imagery collected for this project, including the maps, plans, and aerials, visit the public collection of images hosted in JSTOR. You can also see the citations for the images used in this StoryMap.

ANTH Minor Katelyn Landry creates “Facing the Gulf” exhibit

https://digitalprojects.rice.edu/facingthegulf/

Facing the Gulf: Learning Stories of Slavery in Galveston, 1816-1865 is as a digital archival exhibit and resource guide that attempts to locate the lives and stories of enslaved people in Galveston’s early history. This online repository seeks to accomplish two goals: 1) complicate overgeneralized historical narratives that ignore the nuances of Galveston’s unique realities and landscapes, and 2) to serve as a guide and roadmap for further research into this subject. Katelyn completed the project as an Edward L. Protz Historic Preservation intern at the Galveston Historical Foundation, and received additional funding from the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship. Molly Morgan served as faculty mentor on the project. image credit: Katelyn Landry

Fondren Fellows

The Department of Anthropology partners with the Fondren Library Internship Program for history and digital humanities projects.

The most recent Summer 2024 Fondren Fellows team worked with Burrell Chapel Church and the Historic Texas Cemetery Guardianship Association to investigate the history of the Historic Burrell Chapel freedom colony and reconstruct a historical overview for use in future project seeking historical designations and preservation efforts for the historic cemetery.

2023-2024 Digital Image Gallery

The team created a digital image gallery through JSTOR Forum, with GIS links to georeferenced images. This work made available previously inaccessible images to the wider scholarly community and to the public.

Image Gallery

2023-2024 Plantation StoryMaps

The team also used ArchGIS StoryMaps to create online exhibits of plantation histories for use in educational outreach.

Uncovering the Untold Stories of Levi Jordan Plantation

Illuminating Blackness: Blackness and Erasure in Lake Jackson

HART Project

The Department of Anthropology teams up with the Center for Civic Leadership for a public history action projects.

Most recently in the fall of 2024, the HART team applied for Texas Historic Cemetery Designation on behalf of Burrell Chapel Church with the Texas Historical Commission. Church leadership welcomed the team to present their application, which is under consideration for approval in spring of 2025.

Houston Action Research Team Spring 2021

The Spring 2021 Team created a research-based report on plantation heritage sites offering recommendations for creating a more antiracist approach to public history at Varner-Hogg Plantation

The Varner-Hogg Plantation State Historic Site is a state historical site under the leadership of the Texas Historical Commission. During its 63 years as a historic site, the staff of Varner-Hogg has aimed to effectively present the histories of all of the people who once lived there, with effective changes occurring in the last ten years and continuing today. These efforts are driven by the staff’s desire to update the original narratives at Varner-Hogg that primarily focused on the experiences of White landowners, as opposed to the enslaved persons who lived and worked on the plantation. This semester, we were tasked with providing research-based recommendations for redesigning the public history interpretation offered at the site's Main House and enhancing the depth of the visitor experience. We examined over 75 academic sources pertaining to four key areas of research: anti-racist heritage site curriculum design; community outreach strategies; presentation of slavery-related topics at other heritage sites; and oral histories and individual narratives from the site's plantation period. We subsequently used the research that we gathered to compile the best practices for relaying complex historical information to diverse public audiences within the narrative of seeing the Main House through the eyes of the enslaved who worked there. Finally, we have included a list of projects that we believe would be beneficial for future study and consideration.

HART Spring 2021 Report - https://rice.app.box.com/file/1156590088939

Houston Action Research Team Fall 2021

The Fall 2021 team took the recommendations of the Spring team and drafted a design for museum exhibits in the Main House rooms at Varner-Hogg Plantation

As a community heritage site, Varner-Hogg Plantation (VHP) has been an integral part of transmitting the narratives of enslaved people. Our work on the Main House can expand the exhibited narratives further with a holistic, social history approach. The Houston Action Research Team (HART) designed a six-room exhibit for the Main House of the VHP.Synthesizing anti-racist museum curation practices, history, archaeological research, and existing displays at Varner-Hogg, the exhibition was developed to center the culture of enslaved Texans and their modern-day legacies. Furthermore, the proposed Main House redesign features a focus on cultural independence as a form of resistance. The 6 rooms of the exhibit are 1). An orientation space, 2). a day-to-day life room, 3). a food room, 4). a religion room, 5). an oral tradition room, and 6). an interactive reflective space.

HART Fall 2021 Project Brochure and Posters - https://rice.app.box.com/file/1156583640240