Maritime Landscapes and Structures
Ships sailed on landscapes. Their operations invariably start and end on a harbor, quay, pier, jetty, dock, or anchorage. Only their loss sometimes occurred on the sea, away from land, or on some inhospitable stretch of coast.
The data collected and analyzed under the label landscapes pertain to both the environments and the populations that inhabited them. We are interested in the history of the lands our ships touched, their populations, their cultures, their subsistence patterns, their ecological singularities, and all the human activities that impacted the construction, operation and loss of ships.
Our main focus is to discuss ways in which these data can be shared and used as thinking tools that explain the past and the present, and help us imagine the future.
Our questions are the main questions of Anthropology: Who are we? Where do we come from? Where are we going? What can we know?
Landscape Projects
Americas
Brazil
ImagineRio, Brazil
ImagineRio is a searchable digital atlas that illustrates the social and urban evolution of Rio de Janeiro, as it existed and as it was imagined.
Policies of Memory, Politics of Forgetting
Policies of memory, politics of forgetting - a comparative study of social memory and cultural heritage in Brazil and the United States.
Projeto IÇAR. Saveiros da Bahia, Brazil
Saveiros da Bahia
Colombia
Anthropocene and Climate Change
Colaboratorio Azul
Colombia's Liquid Landscapes
Research projects from the study group
Comunidad Wayuu en la Guajira Colombiana
Culimochos: The Ships from Mulatos, Colombia
A study of the traditional wooden ships and shipbuilding practices of Mulatos, a small Pacific coastal town in Colombia known for its skilled navigators and naval carpenters.
Historical Graffiti in San Fernando de Bocachica Fort, Cartagena de Indias, Colombia
Andrea Amórtegui (andrea.amortegui@est.uexternado.edu.co)Universidad Externado de Colombia
Naval Construction Workshop in Bocachica, Colombia
During the undergraduate thesis of the Universidad Externado de Colombia entitled “Methodological Proposal for the Construction of a Matrix of…
Patrones de Navegabilidad, Accidentalidad y Hundimiento en el Caribe Colombiano / Navigability, Accidentality and Sinking Patterns in the Colombian Caribbean
Autores del Proyecto e Instituciones Vinculadas / Project Authors and Related Institutions
The Culimochos
A study of the Culimochos - the traditional wooden ships and shipbuilding heritage of Mulatos, a small town on the Pacific coast of Colombia.
The Cultural Affiliation of Shipwrecks
Identity is a central in archaeology. Archaeologists associate the concept of identity with human beings as it refers to age, gender, ethnicity,…
Asia
Iran
An Account of Stone Anchors Along the Northern Shoreline of the Persian Gulf
An inventory of historical stone anchors and weights observed along the northern shoreline of the Persian Gulf, between Bushehr and Hormozgan Provinces in Iran.
Underwater Archaeology in Iran
A study of underwater archaeology and maritime heritage in Iran, covering the Persian Gulf, Oman Sea, and Caspian Sea coastlines with approximately 5,000 km of shoreline.
Europe
Spain
Finisterre Shipwreck Survey
The Finisterre Project (2012-2015) documented 16th-century Spanish shipwrecks off Cape Finisterre, Galicia, including remains from the 1596 Armada disaster.
Islas Canarias – Early Diving
The history of the first generation of divers in the Canary Islands and their pioneering underwater activities.
Islas Canarias – The Arozenas Legacy
The Arozena family of shipbuilders and shippers and their 19th-century naval archive at the Museo Naval del Barco de la Virgen.
The Maritime Archaeology of the Canary Islands
A comprehensive study of the maritime archaeology and history of the Canary Islands, from Phoenician settlement to Spanish conquest and beyond.