"A Herring … Furnished by Winney”: The Resilience and Creativity of Enslaved Cooks"

a talk by Barnet Pavao-Zuckerman

(University of Maryland)

ABSTRACT - American Southern cuisines were born around the kitchens and hearths of enslaved cooks, who combined African, Native American, and European culinary traditions to create novel food traditions. Animal remains from contexts associated with enslaved people, such as at James Madison’s Montpelier, demonstrate the plurality of enslaved foodways and the complex interactions between enslaved people, semi-wild places, and animal communities. The diversity of foodways reflects the creativity and resilience of enslaved cooks who created new cuisines within, and despite, the oppressive structures of enslavement under which they lived.  

BIO - Dr. Barnet Pavão-Zuckerman is Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Maryland. She is an historical archaeologist and zooarchaeologist interested in colonialism and human-animal dynamics. Her primary research areas include Native American entanglements with European settler colonialism, and foodways and resilience within enslaved communities. She is the zooarchaeologist for James Madison’s Montpelier and Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. She also serves on the University of Maryland’s 1856 Project Advisory Committee, part of the Universities Studying Slavery consortium. 

Location: Tozzer 203

45 minute talk

20 minute Q&A

Start: 3:00 p.m.

If you cannot join in-person, please email amy_sylvester@fas.harvard.edu prior to November 3, 2022 to request the link to Zoom if you did not receive through mailing list. Click on hyperlink at top right of webpage to subscribe to Harvard Archaeology Seminar Series.