Power in our Past’s Future: Fellowship in Community Empowerment through Participatory Research of Afrikan Cultural Heritage

Initiative from: The St. Eustatius Afrikan Burial Ground Alliance+^[1]
Faro themes: Caribisch Nederland, Democratisering

“Power in the Past” -understanding your Afrikan ancestry is a transformative journey that serves as a portal to self-discovery, resilience, and personal empowerment. By exploring your Afrikan heritage, you are not only reclaiming your identity but also setting a foundation for future generations.

Why this project?
The St. Eustatius Afrikan Burial Ground Alliance has grown from humble beginnings advocating for the safeguarding of the threatened and vulnerable Afrikan heritage on St. Eustatius by achieving local, regional, and international recognition. The Alliance + will grow to partner with key stakeholders, interested and affected parties as well as the governmental and non-governmental bodies on St. Eustatius to ensure that Afrikan heritage on Statia, will serve all and for always.

Access to heritage, community empowerment and partnership
Since the publication of our manifesto “What does the FARO Convention mean for St. Eustatius?” (2022) the St. Eustatius Afrikan Burial Ground Alliance has implemented several projects focusing on connecting the Afrikan descendant community of St. Eustatius (Statia) to engage in their heritage. These projects made clear that engaging the Statian community in their heritage is a lengthy process in which not all obstacles have yet been properly identified.

Certainly, the projects have raised awareness and interest among the Statian community. Family history was researched and written, unique archival resources for St. Eustatius were made publicly available, and the connection with the middle passage ‘liberated’ Afrikans brought home the struggle to reclaim and restore Afrikan Cultural heritage is pertinent on a local and global level.

However, structural engagement and access to heritage remains a critical issue. The design of the previous projects was not set up to sustainably share the results with the community and to guarantee an active role of the community to continue the activities without the project team. Structural change toward a more aware and active heritage community takes far more time than is available for one project. In this final Faro project our goal will be achieved through:

Activities

• Provide more opportunities (including digital) for access to heritage.
• Provision of archival resources to the community.
• Access to cultural institutions offering learning and exploration to history, culture and science.
• Formalize the St. Eustatius Historical Foundation and St. Eustatius Monuments Foundation.
• Improve vital relationships and build lasting partnership between government and non-government bodies.
• Actively engage marginalized youth in their threatened heritage.

Sustainability: creating lasting and accessible impact
With this project, we want to deepen the level and longevity of impact in the community and the society by co-creating lasting tools and structures for Statia. In order to ensure sustainability and real systemic change, the Alliance + partners will seek to meaningfully engage the youth and community through participatory research.

A Statian-Afrikan Cultural Heritage Fellowship Program will significantly empower the local youth (18 to 35) by providing unfettered access to cultural heritage resources, cultural heritage skills development, and mentorship opportunities, fostering leadership and enabling them to drive positive change in the St. Eustatius community. This program will aim to equip young people with the tools and confidence to tackle challenges that face their cultural identity, and contribute to building a society with their cultural heritage as a key partner(s). The Fellowship will culminate in a collaborative capstone research project, where the fellows will present cultural heritage solutions co-designed with their community that address the problems identified during our project “Remember Statia: Tracing Our Origins” and our previous Faro project (https://faro.cultureelerfgoed.nl/thoughts/2200).

How will the community benefit?
With a strong focus on Statia, the program will holistically facilitate the reconnection to their systemically and institutionally marginalized Afrikan heritage. Thus, providing an intergenerational opportunity for restorative justice, healing, and restitution by facilitating safe, constructive, immersive dialogue and interaction between the community and their cultural heritage, through their youth, for All and forever.

^[1] An organizational transformation will see collaborative partnerships with a shared agenda with government and non-governmental stakeholders referred to as The Alliance+ (as explained in the section “Why this project)”