The representation of freed and enslaved people of African descent at sites such as Elmina, Ghana, and Williamsburg, Virginia, are subject to much criticism and praise. “Founded” by the Portuguese in 1482 and later controlled by the Dutch, Elmina is distinguished as the first of its kind. Initially established as a trading center between Africans and Europeans, those interactions soon gave birth to Elmina as a dungeon for holding Africans as slaves for sale into slavery. Williamsburg, a living history museum, is identified as the second colonial capital following the Jamestown settlement. On the eve of the American Revolution its citizens were confronted with questions of freedom, independence, and bondage. While many white settlers fought for independence and freedom from England, they simultaneously embodied slavery and unequal treatment towards enslaved and free African Americans.
Today, both Elmina and Williamsburg reflect historical spaces as memory of the past. This thesis explores the ways that contemporary historical interpreters depict Elmina and Williamsburg. Some of the goals of this thesis are to study and analyze the sites’ contemporary flaws, the sources these flaws, the ways that the histories of these sites are packaged for guests, and to explore how the sites’ guests are encouraged to re-interpret and identify with the trans-Atlantic slave trade and slavery. A comparative analysis of the ways that Elmina and Williamsburg are interpreted by visitors, site administrators and the people that live in and around these sites was conducted to understand how these sites are memorialized. Finally, this thesis addresses questions of “musemification,” preservation, tourism, and the role that these sites play in shaping contemporary identities within and outside the African Diaspora