Review: Portrait of an Island: The Architecture and Material Culture of Gorée, Sénégal, 1758–1837, by Mark Hinchman

Abstract

Mark Hinchman Portrait of an Island: The Architecture and Material Culture of Goree, Senegal, 1758–1837 Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2015, 396 pp., 78 b/w illus. $70, ISBN 9780803280892 Although the island of Goree is a small speck of land situated in the harbor of Dakar, it has nonetheless garnered attention as one of the most visited attractions in modern Senegal. Each year, thousands of tourists descend upon Goree in an attempt to learn more about a site that some have described as a preeminent slave trading port. Contrary to popular legend, however, scholarly research has revealed that the number of slaves who passed through this town in the early modern period topped off in the low thousands, and not in the millions as local guides often claim. Nevertheless, the island remains a crucial site for understanding African histories of architectural exchange. After the French gained control in 1677, the island grew into a commercial port with mercantile ties to Europe, the Americas, and even the Indian Ocean islands of Mauritius and Reunion.1 These trade networks set the stage for the development of a hybrid social system wherein architecture and material culture reflected what Mark Hinchman identifies as the cosmopolitan status of local African and European populations. It is this predicament that Hinchman addresses in Portrait of an Island: The Architecture and Material Culture of Goree, Senegal, 1758–1837 . In engaging the architecture and the social history of Goree during its economic heyday, Hinchman calls attention to the ways in which this enclave incubated a multicultural society comprising individuals who were familiar with the architectural styles, the products, the social norms, and the conventions of dress of Europe, West Africa, the Americas, and even South Asia. Hinchman accomplishes this task in six chapters that draw a vast array of archival documents into a broadly interdisciplinary study. Collectively, his sources include …