Speaker 1: If we were to just stop and actually learn about
Speaker 1: our neighbors, learn about their culture, learn about the wonderful
Speaker 1: things that make them different, and appreciate those differences, and
Speaker 1: celebrate those differences, and celebrate in a way where it's
Speaker 1: part of our collective narrative. I think we will be
Speaker 1: a much better global society to live in than what
Speaker 1: we are today. That was archaeologist Alexandra Jones telling why
Speaker 1: her discipline, which looks back in time, is so important today.
Speaker 1: I'm Alan Ververe and this is Seneca's one Women to Hear.
Speaker 1: We are bringing you one hundred of the world's most
Speaker 1: inspiring and history making women you need to hear. Alexandra
Speaker 1: Jones is an historical archaeologist and educator who teaches at
Speaker 1: Goucher College in Maryland, and her academic work, Dr Jones
Speaker 1: focuses on the African diaspora and how Black communities have
Speaker 1: been affected by development or lost to history. She is
Speaker 1: also founder of the nonprofit Archaeology in the Community. Listen
Speaker 1: and learn why Alexandra Jones is one of Seneca's Women
Speaker 1: to Hear. I'm speaking today to Dr Alexandra Jones, an
Speaker 1: historical archaeologist and educator and the founder of archaeology in
Speaker 1: the community. Dr Jones, Welcome. We're so delighted to have
Speaker 1: you with us. Thank you very much for having me now.
Speaker 1: You're an archaeologist who teaches at Goucher College in Maryland,
Speaker 1: and one of your interests is in covering the history
Speaker 1: of African Americans and enslaved people in this country. How
Speaker 1: does archaeology help us understand the past as well, I
Speaker 1: might add, the present. So archaeology is a tool that can,
Speaker 1: you know, eyes to basically plug the holes where history
Speaker 1: has left people out. Um Oftentimes history is the recording
Speaker 1: of those in power, um men, people who are very wealthy.
Speaker 1: And what you don't seem oftentimes in these documents when
Speaker 1: you go to libraries archives are the stories of the
Speaker 1: everyday person, of the person who is doing the mundane,
Speaker 1: of children of minority groups. And so what makes archaeology
Speaker 1: is so amazing is that it actually makes history polly
Speaker 1: vocal and it gives voice to people who otherwise have
Speaker 1: been silenced. But you're able to find them through the
Speaker 1: dirt and through the artifacts and the objects that lay
Speaker 1: left behind. I imagine this is not such an easy
Speaker 1: undertaking or the challenges involved there's a lot of challenges. UM.
Speaker 1: When we think about archaeology, often time people think of
Speaker 1: just professors going out excavating and kind of doing um,
Speaker 1: you know, great adventurous sort of things. In actuality, it's
Speaker 1: a very expensive undertaking that's very time consuming, and oftentimes
Speaker 1: the general public doesn't know what exactly archaeology is and
Speaker 1: how exactly we can help them in their current lives
Speaker 1: and sometimes in their actual current struggles. And so we
Speaker 1: are often faced with that challenge of explaining what we do,
Speaker 1: explaining how we can be utilized, in explaining the power
Speaker 1: of our actual field. Well, I know you've also written
Speaker 1: about how historic African American communities are endangered by urban
Speaker 1: development and road building, and we often read stories about
Speaker 1: the controversies that are created by these undertakings. I know
Speaker 1: you've got a particular interest for cemeteries. Why is it
Speaker 1: so important to preserve these semiitary areas well? I think
Speaker 1: when we think about communities and we think about ourselves
Speaker 1: and you know how we got here, what we're doing, um,
Speaker 1: part of that or an extension of our community rather
Speaker 1: is our cemeteries, Um, this is the legacy of the
Speaker 1: people have come before us. This is the place where
Speaker 1: they rest. Oftentimes how they've been created and who created
Speaker 1: these sacred spaces often have their own backstories. And so
Speaker 1: in preserving cemeteries, what we're actually doing is preserving the
Speaker 1: foundations of a lot of communities were preserving memory, and
Speaker 1: we're doing that through a landscape sort of form where
Speaker 1: you can go to this place and and remember and
Speaker 1: reminisce on um the phenomenal acts that everyday people did
Speaker 1: in order to get us where we're at today. So
Speaker 1: how does Gibs and Grow figure into this? What's happening
Speaker 1: there and what is your role in that? So? Gives
Speaker 1: and Growth is a African American community that was established
Speaker 1: in the late eighteen hundreds UM, and it was founded
Speaker 1: and started by Sarah and Robert Gibson. And what came
Speaker 1: about in this community is a number of other African
Speaker 1: Americans purchased property UM from a gentleman and they purchased
Speaker 1: it along Sunderlocks Road in Montgomery County, Maryland. And in
Speaker 1: establishing this community UM, what they also did was they
Speaker 1: established everything that they would need to survive and thrive
Speaker 1: because everywhere else around them very much it would segregated. UM.
Speaker 1: It wasn't open or welcoming to them, so they created
Speaker 1: their own church, they created their own school that was
Speaker 1: named number ten. And one of the things about this
Speaker 1: is Gibson Grove is located on locked tin of the
Speaker 1: Sanno Canal. But it was also ten African American families
Speaker 1: who originally purchased property along here. So they started that,
Speaker 1: and then they started a fraternal order and this was
Speaker 1: Morning Start Tabernacli number eight. And this was a chapter
Speaker 1: of a larger fraternal organization that existed on the East Coast.
Speaker 1: And the reason why this was so important was this
Speaker 1: paternal society was also a benevolent society, and benevolent societies
Speaker 1: for African Americans during this time operated much in the
Speaker 1: way that insurance companies operate for US, where if anybody
Speaker 1: in the community became sick, they would pay for doctors visits,
Speaker 1: they would pay for the burials of people, they would
Speaker 1: pay money out to the families UM or the orphan
Speaker 1: children to take care of them um after the depth.
Speaker 1: So it's all of these um sort of things similar
Speaker 1: to what we think of when we think of life
Speaker 1: insurance that wasn't open or available to African Americans. So
Speaker 1: they start their own organization that served that purpose. And
Speaker 1: in doing that, the order established a cemetery and they
Speaker 1: had a meeting lodge where they would meet. They would
Speaker 1: have political meetings, they would sometimes have other religious leaders
Speaker 1: come and visit and talk to them. They had social gatherings,
Speaker 1: but all around the back portion of the hall um
Speaker 1: was a cemetery where they buried everyone in the community.
Speaker 1: And what we're now saying and what's coming up now
Speaker 1: is that in the sixties, um if if you ever
Speaker 1: refer there as a book called The Color of Law,
Speaker 1: and it talks about the federal government and how the
Speaker 1: federal government sought to expand our infrastructure and strengthen our infrastructure.
Speaker 1: But they did it by creating roads through colored in
Speaker 1: African American communities. So they were intentional about this. So
Speaker 1: one of the things people don't think about is when
Speaker 1: you move a community, when you come in and do
Speaker 1: imminent domain and you pay them, you know, minimal amounts
Speaker 1: for their land and move them away, oftentimes what you
Speaker 1: aren't doing is moving the cemeteries and gifts and growth
Speaker 1: is very much a uh situation where you see that happen,
Speaker 1: where the highways split the community and the church is
Speaker 1: actually on one side, and then the hall and the
Speaker 1: cemetery is on the other. As time continued, by destroying
Speaker 1: a community in this way and paying people because there
Speaker 1: were property owners in between that by paying community members
Speaker 1: to leave, what you end up happening is destroying a community.
Speaker 1: And so what we've now seen is that everybody is
Speaker 1: quite excited about the infrastructure bill and the fact that
Speaker 1: we're going to fix up our roads and our highways,
Speaker 1: but we don't. And uh, kind of the back side
Speaker 1: of this is the same roads that initially in the
Speaker 1: sixties cut through communities are actually gonna cause further damage.
Speaker 1: So for this particular community, Um Morning Start Tabernacle number
Speaker 1: eight is actually advocating for the highway not to be
Speaker 1: expanded any further because it directly runs into the actual cemetery,
Speaker 1: Which means that this place, that this resilient community of
Speaker 1: people who had nowhere else to go, who were self sufficient,
Speaker 1: who created all these wonderful things, are now going to
Speaker 1: be disturbed in death as some of their descendants were
Speaker 1: disturbed in life by having them to be forced and
Speaker 1: moved out of the me senecas one hundred women to
Speaker 1: hear will be back after the short break, so Gibson growth.
Speaker 1: Today the cemetery is intact, but it's divided by seven
Speaker 1: Locks Road and the church is separated from it on
Speaker 1: the other side of the road. Is that what I understand?
Speaker 1: So the church and morning starts to have ancro number
Speaker 1: the cemetery. Both of them run along seven Locks Road
Speaker 1: and the highway actually by Sex seven Locks Road, so
Speaker 1: it goes right across. There's like a bridge that was
Speaker 1: across the lots and on one side of that bridge
Speaker 1: as the church, and on the other side is the
Speaker 1: Order of Moses um and Morning Star cemetery and actual
Speaker 1: hall structure. So this is a really important perspective you have,
Speaker 1: especially as you discussed in terms of having new, very
Speaker 1: needed infrastructure repairs occurring, but to do that in a
Speaker 1: way that doesn't destroy what these communities represented and still represent.
Speaker 1: So how did you get interested in archaeology as a child?
Speaker 1: Were you a junior Indiana Jones or was there some
Speaker 1: other motivation? So actually, for me, um, I became introduced
Speaker 1: to it in college. My um mother worked at the Smithsonian,
Speaker 1: so I grew up as a child of the museum,
Speaker 1: So I would say united the Museum was my real
Speaker 1: life experience as a little person, I'm running around after
Speaker 1: hours in the Smithsonian museums. However, I didn't actually learn
Speaker 1: about archaeology and what it does in the role we
Speaker 1: can play until I got to college and I took
Speaker 1: a course per my mother's suggestion. She thought anthropology would
Speaker 1: be amazing for me, and upon doing that is when
Speaker 1: the light bulb came up, came on and I discovered
Speaker 1: archaeology and recognized that all of the benefits and this
Speaker 1: is truly what I wanted to do because the idea
Speaker 1: of being the first person and a hundred, sometimes thousands
Speaker 1: of years to touch an artifacts since the original person
Speaker 1: placed it there, it's extremely exciting to me and it
Speaker 1: is truly fascinating and the influence again of the parent
Speaker 1: in all of this, seeing your mom so involved in
Speaker 1: in museum work at the Smithsonian. So tell us about
Speaker 1: archaeology and the community. When I introduced you, I mentioned
Speaker 1: that you were the founder of this nonprofit. What does
Speaker 1: it do? Archaeology and the Community is education nonprofit and
Speaker 1: it has three problematic goals, one to teach you about
Speaker 1: archaeology to professional development, and three which is general over
Speaker 1: all community programming. As it relates to archaeology UM, and
Speaker 1: this came up because again I am a child of
Speaker 1: d C. I do live in the shadows of the Smithsonian. However,
Speaker 1: the one thing that I noticed was there were no archaeologists.
Speaker 1: They didn't come out to classrooms. We never learned about
Speaker 1: what an archaeologist was in school, and I thought this
Speaker 1: was a huge disservice. Going to graduate school at Berkeley,
Speaker 1: I saw all of the archaeologists from campus go out
Speaker 1: and go into schools and talk to students, and it
Speaker 1: was guaranteed every semester that they would have the ability
Speaker 1: to you know, exchange and talk with an archaeologist. But
Speaker 1: I recognized in my own community there wasn't that, and
Speaker 1: so I just made it my mission to change that
Speaker 1: so that kids could have the ability to go to
Speaker 1: school and to know that there's an archaeologist. And not
Speaker 1: only is there an archaeologist, but there's one who grew
Speaker 1: up here in d C, who you know, does the
Speaker 1: same thing and goes to the same places and kind
Speaker 1: of hangs out and culturally has the same back brown
Speaker 1: as them as well. So I'm here in d C
Speaker 1: as well, and I'm wondering, what's it like when you
Speaker 1: go into the classroom as an archaeologist to explain to
Speaker 1: the students about archaeology and about this community. It's amazing. Um,
Speaker 1: I'm a teacher at heart, so for me it's kind
Speaker 1: of like my second home being in a classroom with children.
Speaker 1: But to see the light bulbs go off, we need
Speaker 1: to start to explain what archaeology is, how it works,
Speaker 1: what are the cool things you get to do, the
Speaker 1: things you can define, the fact that you don't have
Speaker 1: to go to a office, you work outside. Just kind
Speaker 1: of explaining all of like the wonderful aspects of it,
Speaker 1: and then how it also fixes problems because oftentimes when
Speaker 1: people think of archaeology, they only think of textbooks and
Speaker 1: things that you read about where the movies, But they
Speaker 1: don't also think that we work in real time as
Speaker 1: social justice advocates, and we advocate for present communities in
Speaker 1: highlighting what their past is and um, where they came from,
Speaker 1: the importance of remembering and maintaining that past to not
Speaker 1: only them, but to the States and then also nationally
Speaker 1: for our national kind of just history and understanding of
Speaker 1: as as a complete nation. Well, you know, kids always
Speaker 1: have an interesting perspective, whether it's an archaeology or any
Speaker 1: number of other things. Have there things that have surprised
Speaker 1: you by virtue of what they've said to you or
Speaker 1: what you know they've learned. For me, I think I'm
Speaker 1: always surprised when I get the student who's asked one, now,
Speaker 1: I want to be an archaeologist. I think mostly that
Speaker 1: that that lets me know that I did my job right.
Speaker 1: But I've had students tell me before, like, I don't
Speaker 1: look at things on the ground the same as I
Speaker 1: used to because I understand that somebody put it there,
Speaker 1: or it could be something that came, you know, from
Speaker 1: long ago, or that it has meaning um to everyone.
Speaker 1: So just to have a child start to restructure the
Speaker 1: way that they see their lived environment and start to
Speaker 1: look at it differently from art two pictures to structures
Speaker 1: to just dirt um, that in itself is just truly amazing.
Speaker 1: And it surprises me when I do get those comments,
Speaker 1: because again, I mean, you like to believe as a teacher,
Speaker 1: all you know all of your students are listening to you.
Speaker 1: But I think it's truly amazing when they make a
Speaker 1: comment that lets you know they really hit home and
Speaker 1: they are paying attention. But it must still also be
Speaker 1: so reinforcing in terms of validating what you're achieving with
Speaker 1: archaeology and the community that it really makes a difference.
Speaker 1: Do you mostly focus on elementary school age or beyond?
Speaker 1: So we cover elementary all the way theater college UM,
Speaker 1: and so with the elementary and high school students it's
Speaker 1: a little bit different. Elementary it's more introductory UM, explaining
Speaker 1: the different sides of archaeology, doing hands on projects and
Speaker 1: introducing them. Our high schools sudents are field schools where
Speaker 1: they're actually getting out at a site and getting dirty
Speaker 1: and learning how to do the process of archaeology. And
Speaker 1: our college students it's how to interact and talk with
Speaker 1: the public and the community, and how to create innovative
Speaker 1: community programs. So, by working with all of the age groups,
Speaker 1: were kind of keeping the process going of creating really
Speaker 1: great global citizens who are really thinking creatively about our
Speaker 1: past and how we tell those stories. Well, you're certainly
Speaker 1: doing that and working in this field. It must also
Speaker 1: give you a long term perspective on life and current events,
Speaker 1: a different kind of perspective given what's going on in
Speaker 1: our world, how do you see things visiviate the lens
Speaker 1: of archaeology. I think the study of archaeology. Archaeology is
Speaker 1: the subdivision of anthropology, which is the study of humans
Speaker 1: and just human culture UM. And the one thing I
Speaker 1: think that's constantly reinforced to me is that xenophobia has
Speaker 1: always been at the root of a lot of the
Speaker 1: problems that we have within the world. And if we
Speaker 1: were to just stop and actually learn about our neighbors
Speaker 1: and learn about their culture, learn about the wonderful things
Speaker 1: that make them different, and appreciate those differences and celebrate
Speaker 1: those differences and celebrate in a way where it's part
Speaker 1: of our collective narrative, I think we would be a
Speaker 1: much better global society UM to live in than what
Speaker 1: we are today. Well amen to that. I'm always sad
Speaker 1: when we run out of time, which we have come
Speaker 1: to at this point. But I really want to thank
Speaker 1: you Dr Alexandra Jones for what you're doing using your
Speaker 1: great skills and experience in archaeology to uncover the history
Speaker 1: of African Americans and enslaved people in this country, and
Speaker 1: also what you're doing to interest young people in our
Speaker 1: country on the ways that archaeology makes a difference, and
Speaker 1: they can make difference if they pursue that career. So
Speaker 1: thank you so much for being with us and for
Speaker 1: all that you do. Thank you very much for having me.
Speaker 1: What a different perspective we get in our history by
Speaker 1: talking to Dr Alexandra Jones. Here are three things I
Speaker 1: took from that conversation. First, Dr Jones is bringing to
Speaker 1: light the stories of forgotten African American women and men.
Speaker 1: As Dr Jones says, archaeology makes history vocal and it
Speaker 1: gives voice to people who otherwise have been silenced. Second,
Speaker 1: it was exciting to hear Dr Jones tell why archaeology
Speaker 1: can be so meaningful. She described the thrill of being
Speaker 1: the first person to test something that had been placed
Speaker 1: by another person a hundred or a thousand years ago. Finally,
Speaker 1: Dr Jones reminds us that knowledge can bring understanding between people,
Speaker 1: and as we learn about the people who came before us,
Speaker 1: we can appreciate their differences and bring them into our
Speaker 1: collective narrative. Tune in next week to hear about our
Speaker 1: next featured woman and discover why she's one of Seneca's
Speaker 1: one Women to Hear. Seneca's one hundred Women to Hear
Speaker 1: is a collaboration between the Seneca Women Podcast Network and
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio with support from founding partner PNG, Have
Speaker 1: a great day.