Michelle Alicia Cox

Excavating the Silences: Using Theatre to Give Voice to Archaeological Findings and Excluded Narratives from the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade in Barbados | AHRC DTP

Subject: Creative & Performing Arts

HEI: University of Glasgow

School: College of Arts and Humanities, School of Culture & Creative Arts, Theatre Studies

Supervisors: Dr Michael Bachmann, Dr Peggy Brunache, Dr Graham Eatough

Keywords: Theatre, Archaeology, Playwriting, Reparations, Post-colonial, Barbados

Discipline+Catalyst: Archaeology & Classics, Cultural & Museum Studies, Creative Arts & Design

Knowledge Exchange Hub: Citizenship, Culture & Ethics, Heritage

Strategis Themes & Priority Areas: Cultural and Heritage Studies


About Michelle’s Research:

Theatre studies and archaeology are socio-archival disciplines. Archaeology unearths clues about practices of the past, while theatre and performance often negotiate and represent such practices in a contemporary context (Pearson and Shanks). In Barbados, some dig sites are located on colonial plantations, with found artefacts shedding light on those who suffered during enslavement. With the call for reparations for the injustices endured during that colonial era, this research sits at the intersection of theatre and archaeology, aiming to develop a reparative playwriting practice which uncovers the silenced narratives of enslaved people in Barbados during the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.