A good story doesn’t just have the power to captivate, it can also act as a catalyst for connecting individuals and addressing complex issues. That is the spirit behind the Living Heritage Institute at USF St. Petersburg.
The concept for the institute, which seeks to combine storytelling with historical and cultural research that remembers the past and informs the present, gained momentum for USF Anthropology Professor Antoinette Jackson after she launched the Black Cemetery Network in 2021.
An outgrowth of the USF African American Burial Ground & Remembering Project, the Black Cemetery Network sought to locate historical sites nationwide and raise awareness about these sacred places – many of which had been under resourced, neglected, erased and some even paved over for urban development.
“These are not just dots on a map. These are cemeteries where there are people actively involved in managing, preserving and raising issues,” said Jackson, who is also chair of USF’s Anthropology Department. “The Black Cemetery Network is helping to connect people within this community and get information out there about the work they are doing.”
The network launched around the same time the plight of Black cemeteries became a national conversation topic. News stories from across the nation chronicled erased Black cemeteries and spurred calls to action to preserve what remained.
Jackson did countless media interviews for outlets such as The New York Times and was even featured on a segment of 60 Minutes, highlighting the complex history and ongoing struggle to preserve black cemeteries. The groundswell of public attention played a part in Florida adopting a law to preserve and restore abandoned and historic cemeteries in 2023. It also played a role in the passage of national legislation – The African American Burial Ground Preservation Act – in 2022.
“The evolution of the conversation and growth of the Black Cemetery Network showed me how instrumental storytelling can be, the power of communicating research through different mediums to the public,” she said.
Now Jackson is using that model to address other issues impacting communities in Tampa Bay through the Living Heritage Institute (LHI).
LHI is what Jackson refers to as an umbrella structure that unites several initiatives she has been involved with over her career. One arm is the USF Heritage Research Lab that began in 2006 and conducts ethnographic research and archival studies, such as oral histories, to preserve and promote heritage. It also includes the Black Cemetery Network, which currently has 158 sites archived nationwide, helping to identify, interpret and record Black cemetery sites and their histories.
The third prong is the vision for a story studio that would serve as the institute's creative core by promoting mixed-media projects. Such projects would explore new forms of storytelling that help communities, especially those that have historically been marginalized, tell their stories and shed light on complex issues in areas such as public health, education, conservation and more.
“Humans are defined by stories and narratives, both in what is captured in stories and what is not,” said John Pendygraft, who is pursuing his PhD in Anthropology at USF and working with the Living Heritage Institute. “And for those stories that were never told, introducing them now can be powerful.”
Pendygraft, a former Tampa Bay Times photographer, is one of several students assisting Jackson in this endeavor, working to conduct research and creating and designing tools for storytelling.
“The Living Heritage Institute is part conducting the research, part producing the tools to tell the stories,” said Kaleigh Hoyt, who is also pursuing a PhD in Anthropology at USF. “It is also about the power of collaboration and bringing people to the table to solve problems and establish value in these communities.”
Now established at USF in the College of Arts and Sciences, Jackson hopes to see the institute build on the example and success of the Black Cemetery Network to bring people together across Tampa Bay in tackling community issues in a unique way.
“In the coming years, I hope the Living Heritage Institute will be building new artistic approaches to research around these important issues facing Tampa Bay,” Jackson said. “And that through storytelling, it will both enlarge the issue and the community working to solve them.”