Gullah Voices: Traditions and Transformations in the K–12 Classroom
Program participants marvel at the lowcountry landscape and discuss what they’ve learned aboard the ferry to Sapelo Island. Image courtesy of Gullah Voices.
Since 2012, the NEH has funded a workshop for K–12 teachers from across the country to study one of the oldest African-American communities, the Gullah (or Geechee) of the coastal islands near the Georgia-South Carolina border. The isolation afforded by their island homes has enabled the Gullah to preserve many elements of their West African heritage through music, dance, and oral traditions in the face of oppression. Gullah Voices—a partnership of the University of Connecticut, the Penn Cultural Center, and the Georgia Historical Society—immerses participants in the distinct cultural expressions of the descendants of slaves who worked on rice plantations dating back to the 17th century.
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Marker noting the historical significance of Behavior Cemetery on Sapelo Island, which was established by a for enslaved rice plantation workers in 1805. Image courtesy of Gullah Voices.
Throughout the week-long workshop, participants are exposed to diverse forms of knowledge by Gullah cultural historians. Participants visit historic sites on St. Helena Island and Sapelo Island, converse with scholars and culture bearers, and examine artifacts and images at the Pin Point Heritage Museum in Savannah. They also experiment with ways to use the arts to teach history. Teachers try their hand at local crafts and listen to performances by local groups like the Georgia Sea Island Singers and Geechee Gullah Ring Shouters. “These are people whose lives are situated in the creative arts,” explains project director Robert Stephens. Through these experiences, the traditional artistic expressions of the community and oral histories of its members are elevated to balance and enrich primary and secondary sources from the written record.
Stephens and co-director Mary Ellen Junda have guided hundreds of teachers through the workshop, which one participant called “engaging, enlivening, heart wrenching, and powerful.” Throughout the week, educators work in teams to create and share new curricula grounded in primary sources discovered through the workshop. “I return home with not only a much greater understanding and appreciation for Gullah culture,” one participant reflected, “but a renewed vitality for…crafting lessons and experiences that allow students not only to think but to feel. Feel the power of human struggle along with hope and faith in the future.”
Group participants pose under a live oak with Cornelia Bailey, community advocate, cultural historian, and co-founder of the Sapelo Island Cultural and Revitalization Society. Image courtesy of Gullah Voices.
