Tour Guides as Creators of Empathy: The Role of Affective Inequality in Marginalizing the Enslaved at Plantation House Museums

Abstract

Criticized for ignoring or misrepresenting slavery, some docents at plantation house museums have responded by including more references to slavery, but rarely move beyond mere factual references of the enslaved. This contrasts with the emotionally evocative accounts tourists hear about the planter-class family. We refer to this disparity as affective inequality. At plantation house museums, affective inequality is created and reproduced through specific spatial and narrative practices by tour guides. By retracing docent-led tours at Destrehan Plantation, Louisiana, this article engages, conceptually and empirically, with the concept of affective inequality — how it contributes to the marginalization of the history of the enslaved community, and how it becomes reproduced within the practices of tour guides at plantation house museums in the Southern US.