Mémoires Liberées | Anneauxdelamémoire

Freed Memories

TOURISM DE MEMORY - France, Cameroon, Antigua, Haiti

ACP Culture+ Project /// 2015-2018

TOSTEM - Tourism around the Sites of the Slave Trade, Slavery and their Memories

Created at the initiative of Les Anneaux de la Mémoire in 2015, the TOSTEM program, also called "Memories released", aims to preserve and enhance the sites of the and slavery. By bringing together an international network of actors, it strengthens the cultural tourism economy and participates in local development. The TOSTEM program therefore aims to make the history of slavery better known to all audiences, in France and abroad.

Looking to the future, this project aims to highlight:

Dissemination of historical research and knowledge, in connection with contemporary legacies
The enhancement of tangible and intangible heritage: arts, music, literature, dance, etc.
A joint cultural project with African and Caribbean partners.
The dialogue between the memories of the 3 continents

the objectives

This program, which takes place in five territories ( Cameroon, Senegal, Haiti, Antigua & Barbuda, France ), aims to strengthen the cultural tourism industry, work on the professionalization of actors, develop cultural mediation actions, support the creation of cultural goods and services and integrate them into national and international distribution circuits.

The Freed Memories project creates a dynamic around this historical tourism by offering local populations, as well as tourists, innovative cultural and tourist products which will also become tools for promoting the territories.

The main actions of the project

Dissemination of historical research, inventory of sites and heritage linked to the slave trade and slavery.
Protection, development and enhancement of sites and places of memory (often in ruins or deteriorated) to promote access for the general public.
Training of guides, reception staff and site management: the professionalization of the actors is an essential axis of the program which will make it possible to perpetuate the project and contribute to the creation of jobs.
Creation of tourist supports for better access to knowledge on sites and places of memory.
Strategic communication campaign to ensure the economic sustainability of the project.
Networking - from local to international: create a “History and Memory” tourist offer which can later be extended to other countries.
Realization of a large traveling exhibition, which will circulate from 2016. This medium will make it possible to raise awareness among the general public and to set up cultural mediation actions, in particular aimed at young people and in the neighbourhoods.
Educational project: organization of a school exchange in the footsteps of the colonial slave trade between Guadeloupean, Senegalese and French classes. This project is part of a logic of promoting cultural diversity and better living together

actions planned by country

ANTIGUA & BARBUDA

Support for the creation of a museum of slavery and the production of the permanent exhibition and its catalogue.

HAITI

Development and creation of a visit route for the Habitation Dion (ruin of a coffee plantation) and creation of the exhibition and its catalog "Haiti - Africa, 2 hearts in resonance" at the Parc Historique de la Canne à Sucre of Port-au-Prince.

CAMEROON

Creation of a visit route in the footsteps of slave caravans from the western region to the Atlantic coast. The route will include around ten sites with explanatory panels or works of art when there are no remains left.

SENEGAL

Creation of a publication to list the memory sites of the slave trade in Senegal. The objective is to reveal the diversity of sites that exist outside the emblematic place of the island of Gorée.

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Freed Memories International Exhibition

The objectives of this exhibition are multiple but generally aim to reconcile the duty of memory and historical truth, while highlighting the consequences on our current societies:

Present the contexts and historical issues of the different countries
Putting people back at the center of this story
Highlight the tangible and intangible heritage (arts, dance, literature) linked to this period
Valuing the continued resistance of slaves for their freedom
Make the link between history and contemporary legacies

Panorama of the themes that make it possible to cross the stories of the different partner countries:

Exhibition dates:

Haiti, Haitian National Pantheon Museum (MUPANHA) of Port-au-Prince (November 2016 to January 2017)
In Cameroon, at the National Museum in Yaoundé (June 2017 to February 2018)
France, Hôtel du Département in Nantes (May 2016 to June 2016)

Find all the information and news on the website Mémoires Libérées

Potraits

Portraits of artists

Portrait of the artist George MARKS (Louisiana/USA) as part of his participation in the international exhibition "Freed memories: from the origins to the legacies of slavery".