Doctoral Dissertation Research: A Bioarchaeological Investigation of Patterns of Health and Stress Among Enslaved Africans

跨大西洋奴隶贸易是一种旨在最大限度地减少劳动力成本和最大限度地提高产出的经济制度，这对被奴役的非洲人的健康产生了极端不利的影响。这些做法对他们整体健康和压力的影响也反映在可以在骨骼中观察到的病理指标上。这篇博士论文研究在世界历史的更大背景下，使用生物考古学和结构性暴力的理论框架，推进了关于通过跨大西洋奴隶贸易出售的非洲人健康的知识。更广泛地说，该项目有助于确定不平等的根源及其在过去、现在和未来的生物影响。该项目支持培训来自STEM历史上任职人数不足的少数群体的第一代学生，并为过去健康和压力综合分析数据库的开发提供支持。该项目评估了被甘蔗种植园奴役的非洲人的骨骼遗骸的压力和健康状况不佳的宏观表现的流行率。这些人的骨骼指标被与越来越多的关于健康和压力的元数据进行比较。荟萃分析的数据库包括有关牙齿健康、骨骼感染、退行性关节疾病、创伤和营养缺乏的信息，这些信息代表了历史上不同的适应战略和世界各地的社会经济状况。该项目旨在解决两个主要问题。(1)收获和提炼糖的过程如何影响被奴役非洲人的生理健康？(2)在被奴役非洲人身上观察到的骨骼应激指标与历史上其他边缘化人口的这些指标相比，其严重程度和普遍程度如何？PIs对预期的压力水平做出了几项预测，包括参考生存战略和性别角色。该项目使用的比较数据来自世界历史上占主导地位的和处于边缘地位的人口，这将有助于量化奴隶制做法在多个地点和时间段的生物影响。这一奖项反映了国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The transatlantic slave trade was an economic system designed to minimize labor costs and maximize output, which had extreme adverse impacts on the health of enslaved Africans. The impact of these practices on their overall health and stress are also reflected in pathological indicators that can be observed in the skeleton. This doctoral dissertation research advances knowledge about the health of Africans sold through the transatlantic slave trades, within the larger context of world history and using theoretical frameworks of is a bioarchaeology and structural violence. More broadly, the project helps to identify the origins of inequality and its biological impacts in the past, present, and future. The project supports the training of a first-generation student from a historically underrepresented minority in STEM as well as the development of a database for the meta-analysis of health and stress in the past. This project evaluates the prevalence of macroscopic manifestations of stress and poor health for skeletal remains of Africans who were enslaved on a sugar plantation. Skeletal indicators for these individuals are compared to a growing collection of meta-data on health and stress. The database for the meta-analysis includes information on dental health, skeletal infection, degenerative joint disease, trauma, and nutritional deficiency from populations representing different adaptive strategies and socio-economic status worldwide throughout history. The project aims to address two major questions. (1) How did the process of harvesting and refining sugar impact the physiological health of enslaved Africans? (2) How does the severity and prevalence of skeletal indicators of stress observable on enslaved Africans compare to those indicators on other marginalized populations throughout history? The PIs make several predictions about expected levels of stress, including with reference to subsistence strategies and gender roles. The comparative data used in the project are from both dominant and marginalized populations throughout world history, which will assist in quantifying the biological effects of slavery practices in multiple locations and time periods.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.