If you are teaching or learning about the transatlantic slave trade, these resources will help you. You could deepen your knowledge about the local impact and Devon’s involvement by exploring some of the information and real objects in the RAMM in Exeter.
Click on the header of each section below to access the relevant resource.
Information for Devon Teachers
The local connections and important points to remember, including objects traded from Devon, local industries fuelled by products of enslaved labour, and how the profits were woven into local infrastructure.
Kahoot! Quiz
How was southwest England closely tied to the transatlantic slave trade? Do you know the not-so-sweet story of Caribbean sugar? Quiz yourself with well-researched facts from the Royal Albert Memorial Museum (RAMM) in Exeter.
Take this quiz on your own or share with a class.
The quiz takes about 20 minutes. It is especially suited to KS3 students and home learners, but could be used to complement KS2 teaching around topics such as Chocolate, Tudors, the Victorians, Explorers, and Inspirational People.
Finding the Right Words
A guide to language about race and the transatlantic slave trade. You can find a more in-depth glossary from the University of Nottingham and Nottingham Museums here.
Timeline
A thorough timeline that outlines events across four centuries and West Country connections within the bigger picture; some significant moments of resistance around the West Indies, and examples of black and white abolitionists.
Website of the 2022 exhibition In Plain Sight
Includes an interactive online timeline, images of museum objects, 360-degree film of exhibition and all its information panels. The entire text of 84 pages includes examples of named people of African heritage; examples of Devon families and places with documented links to the transatlantic slave trade; more resources for adults, young people and children. A few highlights within this wealth of information are listed here.
We would like to warn you that the online exhibition includes upsetting content and contemporary accounts with language which is offensive and discriminatory. We do not believe it is possible to tell the story of the transatlantic slave trade without including such material.
See a short and sweet video of local places connected with the sugar trade and country houses owned by people who profited from the trade in enslaved people, caught on film today. Joy Gregory, commissioned by RAMM, explains, “I think it is my job as an artist to create a curiosity so people want to dig deeper and… to make something beautiful to talk about an ugliness, and not feel: ‘Oh my god, this is all my fault; I should be hanging my head in shame’.”
Watch a brief film of chats with RAMM curators – of History, Art and World Cultures – putting together the pieces of this shared history, from the clay process to refine sugar and multiply its price, to West African warrior women.
The painting now known as Portrait of a Man in a Red Suit is the most famous artwork in RAMM’s collection, yet we still don’t know who it depicts or who painted it. Listen to different perspectives in this short film and decide what you think.
People of colour living in Devon now explain how this history resonates today as a personal reminder of survival and resistance. Read quotes illustrating the ongoing impact on racism and the legacy of wealth that have influenced our shared history. Listen online to experiences of young people in the West Country, underscored by a soundscape of non-western traditional instrumentalists based in Devon, in Somin Somatic’s Landscapes of Colour project. (Age suggestion 14+; contains stories of racial trauma).
More Devon-related educational resources are published by globalcentredevon.org.uk and the project Telling our Stories, Finding our Roots.
