RISE impact: ‘The Encounter’ at Seville Great House and Heritage Park

Our RISE webinars are bearing fruit in material outcomes, this time at Seville Great House and Heritage Park in St Ann, Jamaica. Tamika Clough, Public Relations & Marketing Officer in the Department of Public Education, Public Relations and Communications at the Jamaica National Heritage Trust (JNHT), has been attending our bi-monthly online RISE meetings  where heritage professionals share their work interpreting and exhibiting the history of their site to different audiences. In January 2026 we discussed young visitors and the possibility for play at sites of enslavement, while March 2026 saw RISE members chatting about engaging school groups at heritage sites.  

Clough went away from these sessions and produced The Encounter – a historical fiction booklet that explores the lives of teenagers and young people at Seville plantation. Browse the resource by clicking on the image below. Here’s what Tamika Clough had to say about the booklet:  

“The Encounter was written to support deeper, more reflective engagement by students visiting sites of enslavement, particularly Seville Great House and Heritage Park. While these sites carry immense historical weight, students often encounter them through facts and summaries rather than lived experiences. This booklet uses short historical fiction to humanize the past, presenting history through the perspectives of young people who might have occupied the same space centuries earlier. The goal is to help students connect emotionally and intellectually, and to encourage journaling to process, question and respond to what they are learning.” 

“This initiative was informed by insights shared during the RISE webinar in March 2026, Engaging School Groups at Sites of Enslavement. The online seminar highlighted the importance of moving beyond passive learning and toward interpretation that is participatory, reflective and age appropriate. It emphasized storytelling, multiple perspectives and opportunities for students to actively respond to difficult histories. These RISE ideas directly shaped The Encounter, particularly the decision to centre youth voices and to pair the stories with journaling as a reflective practice.” 

The Jamaica National Heritage Trust at Seville Heritage Park is also a recipient of an INTO RISE Seed Grant with the University of Bristol’s four-year UKRI-funded research project. Plants, Enslavement and Public History explores the historical connections between plants, people and histories of enslavement by foregrounding experiences of enslaved African people, going beyond the traditional focus on labour extraction and wealth generation for enslavers by considering other narratives of expertise and agency. The Seed Grant at Seville has enabled the JNHT to reconstruct an African Kitchen Garden with plants that were cared for by the enslaved population of the plantation in their personal plots. These small gardens were a source of independence for enslaved people at Seville, giving them the chance to grow their own provisions and specialty herbs and roots.Read more from the Plants, Enslavement and Public History project.