ABSTRACT
The archaeology of the African Diaspora and the relationship between archaeology and the tourist industry are two strands of archaeological investigation that have only recently become subjects of academic research. In the USA, the archaeology of African Americans and indeed the historical archaeology of all non-European peoples was largely neglected until the 1980s, when there was a shift to investigating the pasts of those traditionally left out of American historical narratives. The discipline of public archaeology developed concurrently, with one of its aims being to understand the discursive effect that interpretation to the public had on the creation of archaeological knowledge. This chapter draws together these two strands by examining the way that our archaeological work into the Coin Coin/Metoyers, a family of African descent, was influenced by its location at Melrose, the house built by the Metoyers and now a prominent tourist attraction on the Cane River, Louisiana. The fascinating history of the Coin Coin/Metoyers – one of the Creole of Color families – drew us to work in the area and created immense interest in the archaeology we undertook. With this interest came a tremendous amount of information – some academic, some folkloric – us to unravel, and it also gave an emotional weight that added a significant dimension to the work we did. The traditional stories of the history of Melrose and Marie-Thérèse Coincoin formed the public interest in the material we surveyed and excavated, but also created a narrative that our findings had to engage with and sometimes argue against.
