The South Carolina Department of Natural Resources (SCDNR) owns and manages over 1.2 million acres, of which 176,000 acres are coastal. Within the SCDNR, the South Carolina Heritage Trust Program staff are tasked with protecting some of the state’s most valuable natural and cultural resources in perpetuity under the South Carolina Heritage Trust Act of 1976. When the Act was signed into law nearly 50 years ago, development was the primary threat to heritage. Today, threats to heritage are increasing with the addition of climate-related impacts. While landscapes owned by the SCDNR have been historically divided for the management of natural or cultural heritage, a new transdisciplinary management approach must be examined as climate-related impacts to these coastal landscapes increase. Inclusive conversations, strategic long-term planning, and new transdisciplinary initiatives across and beyond the SCDNR are essential in managing, preserving, and protecting tangible and intangible heritage for current and future generations.

In 2017, Hurricane Irma caused maximum inundation levels of 3 to 5 feet above ground level along the coast of much of South Carolina, causing severe beach erosion. That storm brought attention to the archaeological resources on Cat, North, and South Islands as heritage sites around the world are impacted by the climate crisis, a situation that continues to grow in scope and severity. Archaeologists, geologists, and biologists are using digitized historical shorelines, a SLAM model, an STP survey, and archival research along with shoreline mapping and site assessments to address the impacts of shoreline erosion, while prioritize the telling of Native American and African American stories. This paper examines the impacts of Hurricanes Irma, Ian, and Idalia to sites ranging from a Revolutionary War fortification to a Reconstruction era fishing village and looks at the intersections between natural and cultural heritage and the pressing threats to both.

What happens to a cultural resource after it has eroded from its original context, whether from gradual climate impacts or from a punctuated event like a tropical storm? Brick Kiln Bluff, a quickly eroding estuarine multicomponent site, was previously the living place of Deptford, Mocama, Spanish, and Gullah-Geechee people. Using a naturally deposited pig skeleton and a selection of Deptford, Altamaha/San Marcos, and industrial pottery post-depositional processes were simulated to determine the lateral and horizontal movement of artifacts over two 35-day study periods. Results indicate a surprising lack of movement despite exposure to tropical storms, spring tides, full moons, and strong currents from daily diurnal tides. While the context surrounding these materials was immediately removed with the tides, and thus much of the site-specific interpretative potential, sedimentation of many artifacts occurred quickly, indicating a high potential for diagnostic data recovery that may contribute to larger-scale multi-site synthetic and comparative studies.

For decades, “spoil” and “disposal” material were the terms used to characterize dredged sediment. The expansion of many American harbors, which often includes the deepening of existing channels, continues to relocate large volumes of sediment. In the past coastal engineers solved this problem by creating spoil islands and disposal zones. More recently, coastal engineers have begun to rebrand and recharacterize dredged sediments as a beneficial resource. Successful programs have used dredged sediment to stabilize ecosystems and create and expand wetlands. Additionally, many archaeological sites have already benefited from shoreline stabilization and even beach renourishment projects. Including cultural resources in the structured management plans of coastal stabilization projects provides new opportunities for the long-term protection of sites. This paper argues that archaeologists should consult with coastal engineers and agencies, particularly the Army Corps of Engineers, to include at-risk sites for integration into coastal management and resiliency plans.

Coastal zones are dynamic environments, constantly reshaped by sediment deposition, erosion, sea-level fluctuations, shoreline retreat, and episodic events such as hurricanes, earthquakes, and tsunamis. These processes, operating at varied temporal and spatial scales, pose significant challenges to reconstructing paleoshorelines and determining the original seaward extents of coastal archaeological sites. However, integrating coastal archaeological evidence with geomorphological sea-level markers can provide a more precise approach. This study focuses on the spatial relationships between these coastal features—formed over centuries to millennia—and contemporaneous, permanent archaeological remains, such as buildings, fortifications, and wells. By bridging the gap between geomorphology and archaeology, this research holds significant potential for improving our understanding of coastal landscape evolution and human-environmental interactions in dynamic coastal settings, particularly in light of current and projected sea-level rise.

This paper examines the impacts of climate change on natural and cultural heritage in coastal Sierra Leone during the Atlantic slave trade and abolition era. It focuses on environmental stresses on archaeological records, heritage places, and communities, using Bunce Island and neighboring islands as a case study to discuss climate change-related issues such as frequent storms, rising sea levels, extreme rain events, runoff and erosion, mudslides, and natural resource extraction. This paper reports the preliminary results of the ongoing archaeological research, revealing cultural lifeways and traditional ecological knowledge that have supported the well-being of human communities in the areas over centuries. It calls for community-based resource management in the country and reveals how archaeology and related disciplines can contribute to the ongoing efforts to address climate change and heritage issues by developing more adaptation strategies and solutions that may preserve heritage places for future generations to learn from and enjoy.

Fort Mose is the first legally-sanctioned free black community in what became the United States. This unique community, formed by self-emancipated Africans, provides a glimpse into the imagination, construction, and conflicted nature of early stages of freedom in Spanish St. Augustine. Although money did not equate to freedom, it was at times a critical necessity for navigating and surviving colonial systems. This essay examines the intersection of consumerism and autonomy at Fort Mose through material and historical evidence of access and use of objects at this site. The complexities and significance of obtaining the material evidence at a world heritage site increasingly at risk from climate change and human activities driven by consumerism are an additional focus.

The multi-component site known as 8SJ40 is perhaps most widely recognized as the site of the first legally sanctioned free Black settlement in the United States, called Fort Mose. However, long before the establishment of the Fort Mose community, this land was utilized by indigenous peoples, and as a Spanish mission. Using the historical record, along with data collected during recent excavations at the 8SJ40 site, this paper provides an overview of evidence for mission period occupation at the Fort Mose site. In doing so, the research hopes to contribute to current understandings of mission period sites in Florida’s First Spanish period, extend knowledge of the multiple uses and occupations at 8SJ40, and explore landscape changes related to historic dredging activities and ongoing climatic challenges.