Project

Back-to-Africa Heritage and Archaeology (BAHA) Project

Archaeological and digital heritage research examining the cultural legacy of Black American and Afro-Barbadian settlement in Liberia.

2018 - Present Liberia [Montserrado, Grand Bassa, Lofa, and Nimba County] National Museum of Liberia
Back-to-Africa Heritage and Archaeology Project logo.

BAHA website

BAHA field team documentation image from Liberia.

Overview

As a founding member of the Back-to-Africa Heritage and Archaeology Project, I have conducted fieldwork in Liberia since 2018, investigating the historical and cultural dynamics of nineteenth-century settlement by Black American and Afro-Barbadian migrants.

This work combines archaeological research with digital documentation and museum collaboration. In partnership with the National Museum of Liberia, the project contributed to the development of the institution’s first archaeological collection and digital cataloging system, supporting both preservation and public engagement.

Supporting Media

Project documentation, process views, and field context

Scrollable media rail preserving original image proportions.

Team documentation showing Tubman-related immersive interpretation work connected to BAHA.
Team documentation showing Tubman-related immersive interpretation work connected to BAHA.
Providence Island unit and field documentation image from BAHA research.
Providence Island unit and field documentation image from BAHA research.
2019 BAHA fieldwork image from Grand Bassa County.
2019 BAHA fieldwork image from Grand Bassa County.
2022 Providence Island fieldwork image from the BAHA project.
2022 Providence Island fieldwork image from the BAHA project.

Selected Outputs

  • (2025) Reilly, Banton, Laurore, Stevens - Archaeologies of Black Futurity: Sketches of Liberia's Monuments and Ruins; Undoing Things How Objects, Bodies and Worlds Come Apart - Routledge
  • (2025) Stevens, Laurore - Traveling Treasures: How 3D Technology Connects Liberians to Their History - SAPIENS
  • (2024) Reilly, Stevens - Global Archaeologies of the Long Emancipation: An Introduction - American Antiquity
  • (2024) Reilly, Banton, Stevens, Laurore - The Archaeology of Providence Island: Liberian Heritage beyond Settlement - American Antiquity
  • (2023) Laurore, Stevens - Migration as Resistance? Liberia and the Back-to-Africa Heritage and Archaeology Research Project - Change Over Time
  • (2023) Reilly, Banton, Stevens - Aspirational Architecture and AK-47s - American Anthropologist
  • (2019) Reilly, Banton, Stevens, Gijanto - Back-to-Africa Archaeology and Heritage in Liberia - Nyame Akuma