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African-American Archaeology


Prof. Christopher Fennell

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Available Courses

Instructor: Chris Fennell, office in 296 Davenport Hall, phone 244-7309, email cfennell@uiuc.edu.

My teaching and research projects address aspects of African-American cultural heritage and include development of interpretative frameworks focusing on regional systems theories, diaspora studies, theories concerning social group identities, ethnicities, and racialization, stylistic and symbolic analysis of material culture, and the significance of consumption patterns. I am an affiliate faculty member of the Center for African Studies, the Department of African American Studies, and the Department of Landscape Architecture, and I also host and edit the African Diaspora Archaeology Network and Newsletter. If you are interested in taking courses that will address subjects in African-American Archaeology, please consider the following courses, each of which I offer with substantial components focusing on such topics:


  • Historical Archaeology

  • Archaeology of Illinois

  • North American Archaeology

  • Field School in Archaeology

  • Landscape Archaeology

  • Archaeology and Racialization
    • examples of Yoruba, Haiti, and African-American house plans
    Examples of house layouts at Yoruba,
    Haiti, and African-American sites

    Additional research resources and courses are also available at the University through the Department of African American Studies and the Center for African Studies.


    Rendering of a Kongo Chieftain's grave, from E. J. Glave, Century Magazine, Vol. 41, p. 827 (1891), in J. M. Vlach, By The Work of Their Hands: Studies in Afro-American Folklife, p. 44, 1991
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    African-American Archaeology


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    African-American Archaeology


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    University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

    Faculty Archaeology Anthropology University

    Last updated: September 3, 2008