ABSTRACT
The maritime landscape features coastal settlements, defensive forts, freshwater sources, fishing-related activities, navigational aids, anchorages, harbors, ports, shipbuilding sites, shipwrecks, and survivor camps. Maritime archaeologists inthroughout Latin America and the Caribbean(LAC) have faced challenges in communication because of political and geographical separation, diverse languages, cultures, and legal traditions. Plans are underway to create underwater museums at several appropriate coastal maritime heritage sites, where an official guide will accompany and inform visitors and provide informational brochures. Maritime heritage management is addressed in Argentina in several ways. By 2003, they launched an interactive land-based Maritime Heritage Trail that encourages public visits to thirty-six sites throughout the three islands; these are marked by signs and interpreted with a poster/guide. A dedicated Cayman Islands maritime archaeology program has been proposed and favorably received by the government. Underwater and maritime archaeological research in LAC is enriching not only the collective region but also a worldwide audience, including countries that once conquered and colonized LAC.
