I firmly believe in making archaeology inclusive through collaboration with descendant groups.  My research on the Huedan rural areas has been an open and fruitful partnership with the communities of Savi and Ouidah.  Local community members were involved in all phases of the planning and deployment of the fieldwork.  At the completion of the fieldwork in 2005, Hope Norman and I worked with the Beninese Direction of Cultural Patrimony and the Embassy of the Netherlands to Cotonou to mount a museum exhibit and related series of educational workshops on cultural resource preservation.  Currently, I am working with Savi residents to develop cultural tourism destinations as a means of securing sustainable funding for site preservation and protection.

View the Lost Communities of the Xweda Kingdom exhibit website »