The Unique Gullah Geechee History of South Carolina

Isolation was crucial. Geographically talking, rice farming was done along the instant coastline and islands, much of which being, at the time, only obtainable just by watercraft. “Nobody intended to reside on those separated islands other than us,” claims Rodrigues. Prior to the advent of air conditioning and bug spray, the steamy, buggy shoreline was hostile to vineyard owners’ living standards. “They were from Europe– hot and moist, Europeans really did not do that,” says Rodrigues. “They were also afraid of obtaining jungle fever, a death penalty in those days.” Certainly, native to an environmentally comparable coast throughout the Atlantic, the enslaved shown up with resistance. And lastly, with the expanding period between March and October, hacienda proprietors abandoned for cooler climes, leaving the confined literally separated with little to no supervision beyond a handful of undereducated and surpassed movie directors. “You combine all these factors together and … you might still exercise your African way of life on these vineyards,” says Rodrigues.

While the environmental conditions that enabled Gullah Geechee society to thrive along coastal Carolina were by chance, the fact that the society and people have actually survived into the modern is a testament to their will. “Our individuals endured the Death March to the servant forts of Africa, they made it through the Center Passage, and they endured centuries of generational enslavement,” states Rodrigues. “The story of the Gullah Geechee is among perseverance, of resiliency and decision.”

The very first enslaved Africans were given the “Lowcountry” in the 1600s, and they had an extremely specific experience preferred by British colonists. “My ancestors were competent laborers,” claims Rodrigues. “They took swiped knowledge, stolen skills.” Extracted from what was then called the “Rice Coast” (from Senegal to Liberia and inland), these males and females were forced to use their large expertise of African rice growing (and to a lesser level, cotton and indigo) to the North American coastline. In time, they built intricate irrigation and dam systems throughout the Lowcountry, converting 236,000 acres of ancient maritime woodland right into lavish rice areas. “When you drive down 17 with South Carolina, you see these wide expanses of marsh yard– they’re gorgeous, and they go on permanently. Those are literally the footprint of the rice vineyards,” says Rodrigues. Throughout the 1700s, South Carolina became one of the leading worldwide exporters of rice, many thanks to the expertise and labor of enslaved Africans. And while the conditions of this slavery across the Lowcountry were regular in lots of means, a number of distinct variables helped a singular society emerge from these specific plantations.

While you may not have actually seen the Gullah Geechee of South Carolina, you have actually undoubtedly experienced them. If you’ve ever eaten gumbo, sang “kumbaya,” or remained on a front deck repainted blue, you are living Gullah legacy and continuing African customs that endured the unlikeliest of problems into the modern day. “Our culture continues to affect American society,” states Janette Rodrigeus, manager of the Gullah Gallery of Georgetown. “People just do not recognize where it comes from.”

While you may not have actually gone to the Gullah Geechee of South Carolina, you have actually certainly seasoned them. If you have actually ever eaten gumbo, sang “kumbaya,” or rested on a front deck painted blue, you are living Gullah heritage and carrying on African traditions that survived the unlikeliest of conditions right into the modern day. “Our society continues to affect American culture,” says Janette Rodrigeus, curator of the Gullah Gallery of Georgetown. A meaningful Gullah culture also calcified around percussive songs and dancing, standard sweetgrass basket-weaving, a seafood-based diet, fables involving “haints” and “boo hags” and various other forms of worship. While the ecological problems that allowed Gullah Geechee culture to grow along seaside Carolina were by opportunity, the reality that the culture and individuals have made it through right into the modern-day day is a testimony to their will.

While the enslaved hailed from spread areas throughout West and Central Africa, they located commonalities in the Lowcountry. An English-based Creole called Gullah emerged. “It’s very fast, it’s repetition, like the languages you hear spoken in West Africa,” states Rodrigues. While it’s today thought about a threatened language, there are still hundreds of speakers throughout the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Passage. A meaningful Gullah culture also calcified around percussive music and dance, traditional sweetgrass basket-weaving, a seafood-based diet, myths entailing “haints” and “boo hags” and various other types of praise. Rodrigues points to burial traditions particularly: “the belief was that the water brought us, and the water will certainly take us away, so it was simpler for the spirit to return home to Africa if it was buried near a body of water dealing with eastern.”

Occupying the southeastern coastline from Jacksonville, North Carolina to Jacksonville, Florida, the Gullah Geechee are the offspring of enslaved West and Central Africans whose retention of African heritage, society, and foodways is unmatched anywhere in the world. And while their story can be appreciated in museums like those curated by Rodrigues, the effect of the Gullah neighborhood can also be experienced in the food, arts, and the very landscape of South Carolina still today.

If the arrival of the Union Navy at the beginning of the Civil Battle was a surprise to hacienda proprietors (few bothered to pack or leave prior to their arrival), it was a boon to the Gullah Geechee. The Gullah were among the initial formerly enslaved Africans to see freedom. Leaving out the inheritors’ names from each act made it challenging for former vineyard owners to understand precisely who to take legal action against for land reclamation at battle’s end, making certain Gullah land remained in the household for generations.