The Anti-Borders along the Wilderness Isles of Freedom

Dr. Christy Hyman (Mississippi State University) will deliver this talk as the GeoSym 2023: Spatiality and Sustainability Keynote Presentation and Department of Geography Annual Hammond Lecture.

Against all odds, enslaved people sought refuge in the Great Dismal Swamp. Freedom seekers established communities on mesic islands with elevations at or slightly above swamp level. Archaeologists have explored the maroon settlements established on these islands, and historians have discussed these communities in general terms. This talk discusses
those journeys through studying diasporic exiles in relation to the plantations from which enslaved individuals liberated themselves. She argues that geospatial approaches within historical geography and analysis animate obscured geographies of containment revealing the range of antagonisms that enslaved freedom seekers faced in their
journeys to freedom.