ABSTRACT
One history, that of Louisiana in the era of slavery, but several memories staged for the gaze of residents and visitors: this is what strikes the beholder when walking in Louisiana’s public space. This chapter compares two examples of memorialization of slavery in New Orleans and vicinity. The first one, the “Restore the Oaks” project, is the spontaneous initiative of an Afro-descendant community aimed at reconquering a threatened public space, that of Faubourg Tremé, after the destruction of the neighborhood’s main artery for the construction of the Interstate 10 overpass. The other, the Whitney Plantation Museum, is the private initiative of a wealthy lawyer who funded and built a memorial to slavery on a plantation located in Wallace, in the St. John the Baptist Parish. This chapter presents the two memorials, analyzes the representations of slavery they stage, and examines their reception to show the persisting racialization of the discourse on slavery in Louisiana and the deep fractures that still oppose Louisianans along the color line.
