I was traveling the world and teaming up with historians, researchers, experts in the field of

archaeology, history, storytelling, community leaders, bringing those intentionally sunk

stories to the surface and letting people know that slavery was a global enterprise.

Everyone was involved.

And the number that we think we know of how many black people were trafficked from Africa

and or sold into slavery is very small because the rest of them are under the ocean and the ocean remembers.

I'm Dr. Ray Wynne Grant, and this is a different kind of nature show, a podcast about the human

drama of saving animals.

This season, we're talking to all kinds of nature advocates.

From a paleoanthropologist who hunts fossils in conflict zones,

to someone who helped save an endangered species while in prison.

We're going to hear from real-life heroes with widely different

expertise and life experiences about what led them to be champions for the natural world.

What transformation did they go through to create change within themselves, their community,

and the world? Together, we'll find out how these ordinary people fell in love with nature and became their most extraordinary selves.

This is Going Wild.

Alana Velicott is a marine ecologist, science communicator, and ocean advocate, working in marine research, conservation, and education in the Bahamas and the Caribbean.

She's been free diving ever since she could walk, and her Instagram is well worth a visit.

You'll find pictures of Alana swimming with sharks

and diving through coral forests, all without the use of any equipment. In an underwater

modeling industry that's overwhelmingly white, Alana's stunning images are showing a generation

of young black girls that they, too, belong in the ocean.

...