(In)Visibility of the Enslaved Within Online Plantation Tourism Marketing: a Textual Analysis of North Carolina Websites

Abstract

Tourism landscapes are constructed and marketed in selective ways that reaffirm long‐standing patterns of social power and inequality and thus influence whose histories and identities are remembered and forgotten. The purpose of this article is to conduct an analysis of plantation tourism marketing in North Carolina, measuring the degree to which the history of slavery and the enslaved are (in)visible within online promotional texts. Previous research has found that the slave experience is frequently ignored in promoting the Southern plantation, although the analysis of North Carolina has been limited in the past and no studies to date have examined the promotional images found on plantation websites. An analysis of 20 websites for historic plantations in North Carolina does not reveal a universal exclusion of the enslaved but it certainly shows an uneven treatment both in terms of the absolute number of textual references to slavery and the frequency of these references relative to other themes used in marketing the plantation landscape. Among those plantation websites that show a sensitivity to slave history, two discourses are employed that still run the risk of misrepresenting the enslaved even as they devote needed attention to this marginalized population. They are the discourse of the individual (a)typical slave, and the discourse of the good master/faithful slave. We conclude by highlighting two representational strategies used by some plantation websites that could serve as exemplars for other destinations inside the state and beyond. These strategies include documenting the different identities and histories of many slaves rather just a few, and discussing the hardships and resistance that often characterized the slave experience. The authors gratefully acknowledge the helpful comments of the article's two anonymous reviewers and the support of the Center for Sustainable Tourism at East Carolina University. Derek dedicates the article to his wife Donna and son Tyler. Arnold dedicates the article to his son A. J. and daughter Onyx.