Culture
Sint Maarten National Heritage Foundation wins Dutch research grant to study slavery and emancipation
The Sint Maarten National Heritage Foundation has won an NWO Museum Grant for "From Salt Pond to Emancipation", a project at the Sint Maarten Museum on slavery, labour, ruins and memory. It is one of two Caribbean museums awarded, alongside the Saba Archaeological Center Foundation.
By SXM Daily ·
NWO, the Dutch Research Council, has awarded a Museum Grant to the Sint Maarten National Heritage Foundation, for a project at the Sint Maarten Museum. The money will fund a research project called "From Salt Pond to Emancipation: Slavery, Labour, Ruin, and Memory in the Sint Maarten Museum", led by S.M. Dehaney. NWO announced the award on 21 September 2026.
Photo: Anne and David / Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
The project will trace Sint Maarten's history of slavery and emancipation through the places where it happened and the traces it left behind: historic sites, ruins, family memories, the museum's own collections and archives. According to the Rijksdienst Caribisch Nederland, the Dutch government's office for Bonaire, Saba and Sint Eustatius, the work covers salt production, plantation life and what it called "the long road to freedom", and it also draws attention to the island's indigenous history.
One of 16 awards
The Sint Maarten project is one of 16 research projects funded in NWO's new round of Museum Grants. Most of the winners are museums in the European Netherlands, among them the Rijksmuseum, the Mauritshuis and the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam.
The foundation is one of two Caribbean museums awarded, alongside the Saba Archaeological Center Foundation, according to the Rijksdienst Caribisch Nederland. The Saba project, led by S. Balfour, will compare how collections are managed and stored across the Caribbean parts of the Kingdom and in the European Netherlands, to prepare for a new heritage centre that Saba plans to open in 2029.
The Rijksdienst Caribisch Nederland said the two awards show that Caribbean organisations and researchers can win NWO funding "on equal footing" with institutions in the European Netherlands.
How the programme works
The Museum Grants programme pays museum staff to carry out in-depth research on their own museum or collection. A museum employee can be the lead applicant, and a researcher at a research organisation supervises the work. NWO runs the programme with funding from the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science.
The results have to be published open access, so anyone can read them free of charge.
What it means for residents
The name of the project points to a familiar landmark: the Great Salt Pond behind Philipsburg. NWO says the research should help the museum build stronger exhibitions and teaching materials, and make the history of indigenous presence, salt labour, plantation life and freedom easier for the public to reach.
For schools, that could mean new classroom materials grounded in local sites and records. For families, it is a chance for their own memories to become part of the island's documented history. The Rijksdienst Caribisch Nederland said the work will help Sint Maarten's history "reach more people, on the island and beyond".
What's next
Neither NWO nor the Rijksdienst Caribisch Nederland has published a timetable for the project. When the research is finished, the findings will appear in an open access publication, and the museum plans to use them in its exhibitions and educational materials.
Sources
- NWO, "Van zeemonsters tot inclusieve collectieverhalen: 16 Museumbeurzen toegekend", 21 September 2026: https://www.nwo.nl/nieuws/van-zeemonsters-tot-inclusieve-collectieverhalen-16-museumbeurzen-toegekend
- Rijksdienst Caribisch Nederland, "Two Caribbean museums awarded NWO grant", 8 October 2026: https://english.rijksdienstcn.com/latest/news/2026/october/08/two-caribbean-museums-awarded-nwo-grant-a-strong-signal-for-research-in-the-caribbean
- Wikimedia Commons, File:Great Salt Pond, St Maarten.jpg (licence checked): https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Great_Salt_Pond,_St_Maarten.jpg
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