Harvard University is the new home of the SlaveVoyages site, a database containing information on the history of the Atlantic slave trade.
Launched in 2008 at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, the SlaveVoyages site is currently housed at Rice University in Houston, Texas. Now, the project will become part of the Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery Initiative (H&LS), an investigative program into the Ivy League school’s historic ties to slavery.
Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Emory University, and Harvard’s Hutchins Center for African & African American Research, SlaveVoyages features information on over 30,000 slaving vessels that traversed the Atlantic ocean between the sixteenth- and nineteenth-centuries and uses animation to visually map each individual voyage. The database includes details on nearly 221,000 individuals involved with the Atlantic slave trade, including both ship captains and the humans they trafficked.
“Education is central to the mission of the initiative,” said Sara Bleich, vice provost for special projects at Harvard and the leader of H&LS. “SlaveVoyages’ databases build on the curiosity of Harvard students who catalyzed the university’s ongoing reckoning with its ties to slavery. By co-funding the project with the Hutchins Center, the initiative can help amplify knowledge-sharing and visibility, empower scholars and students worldwide, while also reaffirming our commitment to truth.”
