How teeth are uncovering the origins of enslaved Africans

0:00Hannes Schroeder:This message comes from NPR sponsor Raymond James, a firm where wealth management, banking, and capital markets solutions start with the connections between people. That's the power of personal. Disclosures at RaymondJames.com. WBUR Podcasts. Boston. It was very much a reconnection to myself, a claiming back of identities that I had lost in the sense of my Africanness, my Blackness, my humanness. Workers on a remote island in the South Atlantic Ocean discovered the remains of thousands of people kidnapped from Africa in the transatlantic slave trade. Now they're bringing them home.

0:52It's Friday, August 7th, and this is Here and Now Anytime from NPR and WBR. I'm Chris Bentley. A little later on the show, is the cure for loneliness rolling a 12-sided die? D &D has this magical effect at creating cohesion, camaraderie, and friendship. Here's some level 20 analysis of how Dungeons & Dragons is balancing big business with its small d democratic origins, coming up in about 15 minutes.

1:29But first, new science is reconnecting long-lost lines of genealogy that were severed by the slave trade. Europeans enslaved more than 12 million Africans over hundreds of years, packing them onto ships and selling them into bondage across the Caribbean and the Americas. Britain officially abolished the slave trade in 1807, but its navy continued to intercept slave ships coming from Africa for decades. It quarantined some of the people on those ships on the remote island of St. Helena, a British overseas territory in the South Atlantic. Thousands died in settlements with poor conditions on that island, and they were buried in mass graves, mostly forgotten for centuries, until workers building St.

2:17Helena's first airport in the 2000s unearthed their bones. In a few minutes, we're going to hear from someone who has devoted herself to repatriating those remains, but now we're going to hear from Hannes Schroeder, an archaeologist at the University of Copenhagen. He led a study just out in the journal Science that traced the origins of the people buried in St. Helena using their teeth. He spoke to Scott Tong. In this case, we used isotope analysis, actually a combination of isotopic analysis and ancient DNA analysis. So an isotope is essentially just a different version of an element, to put it very simply.

2:54Isotopes vary in a landscape based on geology, for example. And then we, through the food and water, we tend to absorb these isotopes. And so you can measure those, and then you can relate those back to the geology. And that's, in essence, how it works.

3:14Hannes Schroeder:Then you examine the teeth for the isotopes, and that's where the interesting part begins as far as tracing back to location? That's right, because basically the teeth pick up the signature, if you want, of the place where people grew up. And then you can measure those in archaeological remains, and you can relate those back to the geological measurements. Hearing you talk about the science, it just sounds amazing, right? Because these human remains, centuries old, and here the science has arrived to answer some of these questions. Is this brand new science? I understand it took 10 years to publish these results.

3:50Hannes Schroeder:Were you kind of along the way waiting for the science to develop? I mean, so isobanalysis have been around for a while. It's fairly easy to establish whether somebody, you know, didn't grow up in the place where they were buried, but it's much harder to try and establish where they had actually come from. And there have been some developments here in the field, and that's the use of these isoscapes. So that's a fancy term to basically say variations of isotopes or isotopic ratios across a landscape, right? So imagine a map that basically maps out this isotopic variation. And because we have those now four places, like Sub-Saharan Africa in this case, we can use those maps and then relate them to the measurements that we make.

4:34And we can, based on those comparisons, essentially, we can come up with estimates as to where people most likely would have come from.

4:41Hannes Schroeder:So then, coming to these remains found on St. Helena, what did you learn about where some of these persons came from? How accurate could you get? Yeah. And of course, I mean, up front, you know, we should definitely say that we're dealing with probabilities here, right? We're not able to pinpoint a specific village or anything like that. I see. Yeah. But really what we can see was that these individuals came from many different parts of Africa. The vast majority came from places now in Angola and the Republic of Congo. So, and, you know, parts of essentially coastal areas of West Central Africa.

5:17But what was surprising is that a significant number of the individuals we analyzed came from much further inland, so hundreds, not thousands of kilometers into the African interior.

5:29Hannes Schroeder:Wow. I can imagine, you're a scientist, but some of these discoveries might be painful to learn. No, I mean, dealing with this history and also working with the community on Santolina there, I mean, of course, even though, you know, the science is exciting, you know, but really, ultimately, it's not about DNA or chemistry here. It's about people. And it's, you know, as one of the darkest chapters in human history. Very, very, very simple. And going forward briefly, Hannes, what is next for this developing science? What future applications can you think about? So the Santillina case is a very interesting one, but museum collections in Europe, but also in the U.S.

6:13are full of human remains, and some of them come from, you know, colonial contexts, so, you know, grave robbing and all kinds of things. Of course, yes, yes. In some cases, you know, it's clear where they came from, but in some cases there are no records. And so what I'm interested in is to perhaps how we can use these methods to try and see where these remains should potentially be repatriated to. But just to add, this creates an interesting catch-22 here, and that is that usually, as it was in the case of St. Helena, really it's the community that asks us to carry out these analyses. But of course, if we don't know which community we're talking to, because we don't know where these remains come from, then who do you ask?

6:57So this is a complex question.

7:00Hannes Schroeder:Hannes Schroeder is Associate Professor at the University of Copenhagen. Hannes, so good to talk to you. Thanks very much. Thanks, God. Thanks for having me.

7:23We will be right back with more from someone who was moved by this discovery to reconnect those remains with their ancestral homelands. Stick around.

7:52Hannes Schroeder:And now to a more personal story connected to these findings and remains. Anina Funil came across them more than 10 years ago. She was working on an airport construction project in St. Helena, and it changed her career and her life. She began working to rebury properly the remains, and today she works with communities impacted by colonialism and slavery through a nonprofit called The Tiki Box Project. Anina, welcome to the program. Thank you, Scott. So great to be here. Good to have you. We should know that your story is told in a documentary called A Story of Bones. There's a scene in the documentary where you're looking at some of these skeleton remains where you see braids and beads.

8:36Hannes Schroeder:And I wonder, at that moment, was it a visceral moment? Was there kind of an emotion that started to, I don't know, overwhelm you as you were processing this? You know, when I came to the island of St. Helena, I came as an environmental officer for the airport project. I had a background in archaeology. So, like in all instances, I should have been prepared for the scientific part of what I was about to experience. the data, the knowledge, the history. But I was not expecting to see a braid. I wasn't expecting to see human remains. I was expecting to see possessions, beads and that. So the braid was so perfectly, perfectly intact.

9:29So perfectly intact. And it just, it looked exactly like my hair and hair that I've touched before. Oh my goodness. And that very human interaction that we have with braiding each other's hair, my mom braiding my hair, and just having hair, it was completely overwhelming. I was not prepared to feel such an immense connection. And hair is such an important part of my journey as an African woman, as a person of African descent. so yeah that really that really affected me on a on a on a pretty physical emotional spiritual level

10:12Hannes Schroeder:yeah so at those levels what happened next for you I mean you've written that it became a journey to negotiate your own identity somewhere along the line did you start asking questions like should this be my new career should this be my journey my professional journey You know, what I had on St. Helena was a lot of time. I had more than 12 years. I had the support of an incredible community. So I had the privilege of developing a profound relationship with the burial grounds, with the community there, but also with the ancestors. and you know when when people refer to it as a career and a professional choice it very much wasn't that it was very much a reconnection to myself a claiming back of identities that I had lost in the sense of my Africaness my blackness my humanness you know and just respecting this a very profound relationship that we have with the earth, which is contained in the space called a burial ground, you know, our rites and rituals, how we invest in the land and return ourselves to the land.

11:27And it's a journey that is still ongoing. And I've been so privileged to return home, to return to Namibia, where I was born and retrace some of my steps, my ancestors' steps, but also to reach communities throughout the African diaspora that are tied to this sacred grounds in the middle of the South Atlantic Ocean and share that story with them. So, yeah, it doesn't feel like a professional journey. It has been manifested as such, but it's very much a spiritual pilgrimage.

12:07Hannes Schroeder:going beyond St. Helena with the science, the emerging science we have today, there will be more remains found excavated around the world. What do you hope to see going forward as more of these discoveries happen? I feel that science can only take us so far. There is another intelligence, knowledge, which is sacred, which require for a community to be brave enough to remember. The knowledge and the intelligence that is held by a sacred burial ground tied with specific rites and rituals is so significant and so important for a diaspora that has to heal foremost. Knowledge and intelligence. I like that.

12:54Hannes Schroeder:We've been talking to Anina Fanil, founder and CEO of the Tiki Box Project, and her story is told in the documentary, A Story of Bones. Anina, thank you very much for talking to us from Namibia. So good to talk to you. Thank you. Thank you so much. It's so good to be here.

13:16Fascinating stuff. You can learn more about this story at hereandnow.org. we'll be right back with one more conversation for you about something completely different from a galaxy far far away

13:41people have been playing dungeons and dragons for 52 years and for almost as long 49 years a lot of those same people have been fans of Star Wars. So a new official partnership between these two titans of nerddom makes sense. D &D is having a moment with millions of players around the world, and more than a few at NPR, but some fans are skeptical that brand partnerships can ever match the power of their own imaginations. Here in Now's James Mastromarino reports. Tabletop role-playing games only require paper, an active imagination, and maybe some dice. Four. But these games are also big business.

14:30Hello Gen Con! How we doing tonight? That's Dan Ayub, head of Dungeons & Dragons, speaking in a crowded theater at Gen Con. The Indianapolis event is the biggest tabletop gaming convention in North America. regularly hosting more than 70 ,000 attendees. And it's where D &D unveiled an ambitious new strategy. Dungeons & Dragons is 52 years young, and that means that we have the responsibility of ensuring that all of our players have experiences that feel authentic to them. As part of the new push, Dungeons & Dragons announced a return to classic product lines and crossovers with Star Wars.

15:12and the massive video game World of Warcraft.

15:21Laura Homan oversees the new brand partnership effort. World of Warcraft at its heart was inspired by Dungeons & Dragons. It has a lot of familiar motifs and types of characters, so we have a lot of shared DNA. On the flip side, where World of Warcraft is very similar to what our players are used to, Star Wars, you know, you're taking it to space. So there's a lot of new ways to play in that setting. But it's not all new. Technically, these kinds of crossovers have happened before. D &D does have a history of doing this previously in other editions. We did a collaboration with Star Wars back in the early 2000s.

15:59So it is new for this generation of the game, but it's not new to the game at all. The game's executive producer, Greg Bilsland, says the time is ripe for a return. Dungeons & Dragons has brought a lot of new people into the hobby with things like Stranger Things, so this is the perfect time to fuse those things back together and give all those Star Wars and D &D fans what they've been asking for. Some of those fans are right here, at NPR's headquarters in Washington, D.C. My name is Valentina Rodriguez-Sanchez, audio engineer at NPR. She, and fellow engineer and Dungeons & Dragons player, Carly Strange, joined me to unpack the Star Wars crossover news.

16:38You know, some may call it a cash grab. That could totally be what it is, but it's definitely hitting its mark. What you're saying is it's going to work on you. It's going to definitely work on me. I live in a galaxy far away. I'm wearing NASA socks. Engineer Carly Strange is more skeptical. What are they going to offer me that I couldn't make up myself or that my friends and I couldn't make up ourselves? And also, how much money are they going to want from me? After all, anyone can make their own content for the game for free. Fans have already been blending Star Wars and other worlds into D &D for decades.

17:14Once again, here's D &D executive producer Greg Bilslund. You know, one of the dirty secrets of D &D is that, you know, you really don't need a lot of books to make your own content. But one of the things that Dungeons & Dragons provides is integration with our digital tools, as well as books full of beautiful art and official options that just make it much easier to get started. But other longtime players are unconvinced by that pitch. My name is Mike Ciaplinski. I support the various systems we use for production and delivery here at NPR. And I've been playing D &D since 1979. Chaplinsky acknowledges that Dungeons & Dragons is immensely successful in the tabletop role-playing game market, but he doubts if it can replicate what's worked for parent company Hasbro's other mega-successful fantasy franchise, Magic the Gathering.

18:04Every other role-playing game out there, if you add all of the money they make together, it's a pittance compared to what D &D makes as a brand. But as much money as D &D makes, it pales in comparison to the money that Magic the Gathering makes. Magic, the trading card game, grosses more than a billion dollars every year. Hasbro credits the growth to its ramped up product release schedule and its crossovers with properties like The Lord of the Rings and Marvel Superheroes. So it's unsurprising that Dungeons & Dragons is adopting a similar strategy. Again, product architect Laura Homan. Dungeons & Dragons has for a long time been maybe something that people see at conventions or haven't really experienced but are aware of through pop culture.

18:51We're really hoping to, bringing these brands into the game, have people who maybe thought it wasn't for them try it. D &D executive producer Greg Bilsland says that crossover push won't come at the expense of the classics that players love. We like to say, you know, not every product for everyone, but a product for every person. So if you're not into horror like Ravenloft, which we just released, You might look ahead to something like Dark Sun and you're like, oh, I want to play some grim dark fantasy or I want to play in a science fiction universe and play Star Wars. Ultimately, Bill's Lens sees Dungeons and Dragons as a cure for what he calls a loneliness epidemic.

19:32D &D has this magical effect at creating cohesion, camaraderie, and friendship. And if releasing more products to welcome people into the hobby is the way that we're able to reduce a little bit of the loneliness in the world, then I think it's worth making more products and releasing more things to do that. Whether the new strategy will work out for Hasbro, well, that's still a roll of the dice. James Mastromarino. Lots more games coverage from him on his sub stack. It's called Games with James. And you can find more interviews and stories about all things gaming at hereandnow.org.

20:14That's game over for Here and Now anytime today. This podcast is a production of NPR and WBUR Boston. Jessica Carissa produced the story about human remains and the slave trade. Today's editors were Micaela Rodriguez and Michael Scotto Technical direction from Caleb Green Matt Reed and Nick Dussault Our theme music is by Mike Moschetto Max Liebman and me, Chris Bentley Our digital producers are Alison Hagen and Grace Griffin And here and now's executive producer is Alan Price Thanks for listening, I'll be off for a bit Getting some tape for stories you'll hear soon And taking a little bit of vacation But here and now anytime We'll be back with you on Monday Thank you.