The African Archive Beyond Colonization

This project was part of a new initiative that aimed to rehabilitate and recenter the African collections held in the Stanford University Archaeology Collections.

Alongside BIPOC Curatorial Postdoc Dr. Denise Lim, students were invited to conduct in-depth research on 15 African objects from Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, the Sudan, South Sudan, and South Africa. In a course co- taught by Dr. Lim and Prof. Sarah Derbew, “The African Archive Beyond Colonization” (Fall 2021), students prototyped a virtual exhibition that archived their research contributions and served as a digital complement to the on-site exhibition, Reimagining African Borders Through Cultural Objects, which is on view at the Stanford Archaeology Center until May 2023.