Into the Depths with Tara Roberts: Reclaiming History Beneath the Water
Did you catch the IG Live with Nadine Duncan & Tara Roberts!?
Click Here to view the live interview on IG!
Who is Tara Roberts?
Tara Roberts is a National Geographic Explorer & Storyteller who follows a group of Black scuba divers (Diving with a Purpose), historians, and archaeologists as they search for and help document slave trade shipwrecks worldwide. She makes the untold stories of our ancestors come to life through her six series podcast,
Into the Depths.
There are travel stories that entertain us.
And then there are stories that completely shift how we understand the world.
This conversation with Tara Roberts did exactly that.
When most people think about scuba diving, they imagine coral reefs, tropical vacations, or underwater adventure. But for Tara and the Black scuba divers featured in Into the Depths, diving became something much deeper: a way to reconnect with history, honor ancestors, and uncover stories that were intentionally lost beneath the ocean.
The result is one of the most powerful explorations of identity, ancestry, and collective memory I’ve encountered in travel media.
What Is Into the Depths?
Into the Depths is a six-part podcast series from National Geographic that follows Tara Roberts as she joins Black scuba divers searching for shipwrecks from the trans-Atlantic slave trade.
These are the ships that trafficked millions of enslaved Africans across the Atlantic between the 15th and 19th centuries.
But this podcast is not simply about shipwrecks.
It is about reframing the origin story of Africans in the Americas.
Instead of centering only trauma, statistics, or historical abstraction, Tara’s work humanizes the people connected to these journeys. The podcast explores who they were, what they survived, what was lost, and how descendants continue to carry those histories today.
Across the series, Tara travels from Florida to Costa Rica, from Africa to her family roots in Edenton, uncovering stories connected to ancestry, migration, memory, and survival.
Why This Story Matters
One of the most impactful parts of Tara’s work is how she centers Black divers in spaces where Black people have historically been underrepresented.
For many people, scuba diving is not something commonly associated with Black communities. Yet the divers featured in Into the Depths are reclaiming both water and history.
That perspective matters.
Too often, conversations about the trans-Atlantic slave trade stop at suffering without fully acknowledging the humanity, cultures, relationships, dreams, and identities of the people involved.
Tara’s storytelling brings nuance and empathy back into the conversation. That emotional depth is what makes this project unforgettable.
A Personal Journey
What makes Into the Depths especially compelling is that Tara does not present herself as a detached narrator.
She allows listeners to witness her own personal evolution throughout the series, and her emotional connection to the stories being uncovered.
That vulnerability creates a very different listening experience than a traditional history podcast. Instead of simply teaching history, Tara invites listeners into a journey of discovery alongside her.
That approach aligns strongly with what many travelers — especially Black travelers — are looking for today: deeper cultural connection, identity exploration, and experiences that go beyond surface-level tourism.
The Voices Behind the Podcast
The series features more than 40 voices, including:
- Black scuba divers
- Underwater archaeologists
- Historians
- Researchers
- Descendants of enslaved Africans
- Cultural experts connected to the slave trade’s legacy
National Geographic’s Expanding Coverage
The podcast is part of a larger storytelling initiative from National Geographic.
Tara Roberts was also featured on the cover of National Geographic Magazine, highlighting her journey alongside these divers as they work to investigate and preserve the stories connected to the Middle Passage.
In addition, National Geographic released the documentary:
Clotilda: Last American Slave Ship
The documentary explores the discovery of the Clotilda, the most intact slave shipwreck discovered to date and the only known slave ship for which historians know the full story of the voyage, passengers, and descendants.
That discovery continues to reshape how historians and descendants understand this period of history.
Why Black Travel Media Needs Stories Like This
As someone who spends a lot of time discussing travel through the lens of Black women and cultural connection, this conversation stood out because it expands the definition of travel storytelling.
Travel is not always about escape. It’s about return, remembrance, and confronting history honestly enough to heal from it.
Projects like Into the Depths remind us that travel media can educate, preserve culture, and deepen our understanding of ourselves and one another.
Final Thoughts…
Tara Roberts is doing important work.
Not just because she is uncovering shipwrecks, but because she is helping uncover stories that generations of people were never fully taught to see with humanity and complexity.
Into the Depths challenges listeners to think differently about history, ancestry, identity, and belonging.
And through the lens of Black scuba divers reclaiming space both underwater and within historical narratives, the series becomes something even bigger:
A reminder that our stories deserve to be found.
Even the ones hidden beneath the surface.
The podcast is now available on Apple Podcasts, http://natgeo.com/intothedepths, and wherever podcasts are found!
