ARC 38.2 - Archaeology and the Publics

Chike Pilgrim; Stanley J Onyemechalu

It has been exactly 40 years since the publication of one of the earliest ARC issues: Volume 2:1 Archaeology and the Public (1983), emerged from a Theoretical Archaeology Group conference put on by Mike Parker Pearson and others in 1982. Our publication likewise has strong theoretical underpinnings. Archaeology as a discipline has never been more concerned with its positionality within public discourses and its relativity to different segments of the publics. This is because the Information Age has brought with it new challenges with respect to what defines public spaces and who are accepted as authorities in these spaces (Stephens et al 2023). By pluralising the ‘public’ in our volume title, Archaeology and the PublicS, we hope to demonstrate and highlight the multivocality and diversity inherent in the public – and the opportunities and challenges that come with this diversity.

ARCHAEOLOGY and the PUBLICS EDITED BY: CHRISTOS NIKOLAOU, STANLEY ONYEMECHALU, CHIKE PILGRIM, AND BENNY SHEN VOLUME 38.2, NOVEMBER 2023 Archaeology and the Publics edited by Christos Nikolaou, Stanley Onyemechalu, Chike Pilgrim & Benny Shen November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics I The Archaeological Review from Cambridge is a biannual journal of archaeology. It is run on a non-profit, voluntary basis by postgraduate researchers at the University of Cambridge. Although primarily rooted in archaeological theory and practice, the ARC invites a wide range of perspectives with the aim of establishing a strong, interdisciplinary journal which will be of interest to a variety of fields. Archaeological Review from Cambridge Department of Archaeology University of Cambridge Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3DZ United Kingdom http://arc.soc.srcf.net Volume 38.2: Archaeology and the Publics © The Archaeological Review from Cambridge Theme Editors: Christos Nikolaou, Stanley Onyemechalu, Chike Pilgrim and Benny Shen Published in November 2023 ISSN 0261-4332 Issue design by Christos Nikolaou, Chike Pilgrim and Benny Shen based on Oliver Antczak Graphic Design by Renee Yearwood and cover design by Tecla Negro All articles for publication in the Archaeological Review from Cambridge are peer-reviewed All images are the authors’ own, except where otherwise stated Printed by: Victoire Press Ltd ARC Committee General Editor Marianna Negro Treasurer Megan R. Hinks Secretary Christos Nikolaou Book Reviews Stanley Onyemechalu Subscriptions Natasha Rai Open Access Guganesan Ilavarasan Web Management Chike Pilgrim Publicity and Events Julia Gustafson Back Issue Sales Benny Shen General Members Glynnis Maynard, Liam McClain, Rachel Phillips, Ali Giritlioglu, Julia Gustafson, Polina Kapsali, Simon Stoddart, Alexes Mes, Benny Shen, Andriana-Maria Xenaki, Maria M. Gajewska, Dylan O. Flicker, Jinoh Kim, Nynke Blomer, Jake Stone, Elizabeth Popovic, Devika Kainth, V.G. Marcano, B.A. Lucas, Ihini Aambreen, Luca Adams, Siddharth Kutty, Nicole Marie Newhouse, R. Moffat, D. Sicotte, N.P. Zocco, Katrina Rorhus, E.M. Wright, Beatrice Tailby Hardstaff, Madhulika Chebrol, Lola Graziani, P. Bergaudas, E.G. Oldridge, R.T. Russell, O.K. Rostad, Denéa S. II Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Contents v Acknowledgements Editorial Archaeology and the Publics Christos Nikolaou, Stanley Onyemechalu, Chike Pilgrim, and Benny Shen 1 Contributions Ghosts of Archaeology: The Journey of Archaeological Knowledge from Science to Science Fiction Andrea Kocsis 14 Politics on a Small Scale: Archaeological Ethnography as a Lens of Understanding Community Politics Klairi Gianniri 35 Towards a new project design methodology for archaeological projects in England Sadie Watson 58 Archaeology, Indigenous and Local Knowledge, and Climate Change in the Caribbean: Select Case Studies among the Kalinago, Macushi and Maroon communities in the Windward Islands and the Guianas Andrea Richards, Cheryl White, Louisa Daggers, Thanya Soké-Fonkel, Annalisa Edwards, Augustine Sutherland and Irvince Auguiste 78 From Soot to Saplings: Integrating Industrial Pasts into Public Demands for Environmental Sustainability Kieran Gleave November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 106 III Contents Digital Archaeology In Schools: The Use Of Archaeological Games In Public Education In The State Of São Paulo in Brazil Amanda Daltro de Viveiros Pina and Matheus Morais Cruz 128 Stonehenge in Punch Cartoons 1860-1999: A Leaky Pipeline from Experts to the Public Gregorgy Michaelson 147 Cultural Heritage in Modern Conflicts: A Theoretical Analysis of Memory and Materiality in Babylon, Iraq Martina Bortolan 171 Untangling Difficult Heritage: Arguing for Equal Linguistic Access for Stakeholders of Past International Conflicts Oliver Moxham 186 Construction of the Archaeological Inventory of the Sites with Rock Art of the Vides River. Sara Valentina Guerrero Gonzalez 201 Exploring the Complex Relationship between Archaeology and Society: Lessons from India's History Aritri Samadder 226 Forthcoming Issue 240 IV Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Acknowledgements This volume is a collective effort and credit for its creation goes beyond just the four of us. We wish to thank our peers in Cambridge for stimulating discussions and feedback. Thanks also go to the ARC Committee for helping steer us through the process. Special thanks to Marianna Negro for her role as General Editor, and to Tecla Negro for the front cover illustration. Thanks also go out to Renee Yearwood for the cover design and Oliver Antzcak, for helping with typesetting. The most important heroes of this volume are the authors, whose articles adorn our volume like constellations in the night sky, and the reviewers for their feedback being as fluid as a cleansing river. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics v V VI Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Archaeology and the Publics Christos Nikolaou, Stanley Onyemechalu, Chike Pilgrim & Benny Shen Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge It has been exactly 40 years since the publication of one of the earliest ARC issues: Volume 2:1 Archaeology and the Public (1983), emerged from a Theoretical Archaeology Group conference put on by Mike Parker Pearson and others in 1982. Our publication likewise has strong theoretical underpinnings. Archaeology as a discipline has never been more concerned with its positionality within public discourses and its relativity to different segments of the publics. This is because the Information Age has brought with it new challenges with respect to what defines public spaces and who are accepted as authorities in these spaces (Stephens et al 2023). By pluralising the ‘public’ in our volume title, Archaeology and the PublicS, we hope to demonstrate and highlight the multivocality and diversity inherent in the public – and the opportunities and challenges that come with this diversity. Archaeology is not purely scientific. This is because all archeological data is embedded in the past, and so is non-testable. There is no way to truly falsify an archaeological hypothesis. In contrast, purely scientific methods can form hypotheses and then repeat tests until these are falsified or confirmed. Archaeology therefore does not adhere solely to the hypothetico-deductive model advanced by Popper (2014) and proposed in the field by Binford (1969). Archaeology and the PublicS, by pluralising the "Public" embraces some of this post-processualism as an admission that archaeology is subjective and open to interpretation (Hodder 2004). Simply put, we believe that there are many publics and no meaningful relationship with archaeology can begin without first recognising this fact. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 1 By resisting the dualism implied by Strauss (1972) we avoid solidifying the public and archaeology into one monolithic pair, and so oversimplifying human experiences and agendas. Also, by doing away with dichotomy – and duality of any kind – we are able to sift domains into their constituent parts - to atomize them, so to speak. Archaeology, by its very nature, is a vast discipline - it is the study of the remains of humans in all places throughout all time related to human existence. This combination of materials and peoples is all-encompassing. Archaeology is conducted to what aim then? Why devote all of this natural and social scientific study to this tremendous space-time block? For the sake of curiosity is always a good and satisfying response to the question Why study something? (Einstein 1955). However, through this theme we have chosen, we also argue that archaeology has a very public profile and a resultant public debt. Archaeology's progression away from its roots in an irresponsible 16th and 17th century Antiquarianism is thus emphasised by our choice of topic. This earlier (primarily Western and European) network of upper-class collectors and imperial forces seeking through private collections to build “national histories” and “national museums” is addressed by our use of Publics. Often this meant ‘sanitising’ archaeological heritage in accordance with Eurocentric narratives (Hamilakis and Greenberg 2021) or the appropriation of heritage by colonial populations to disempower native colonised groups (Matenga 2011). These former acts of collecting are understood as being indifferent or even antagonistic to groups, civilizations and movements with their own separate reasons for enquiring after and interrogating the material past. We use the term Publics here to therefore partially mean localised communities who were formerly subjected to imperial and colonial extractivism. We have here recognised them as key stakeholders in archaeological and heritage practice. In these imperial and colonial contexts, archaeological questions and investigations have often revolved around material culture, and only recently have grown to concern people and their relationship with their environments. Similarly, in studying how the past is used in the present, heritage scholars and practitioners have sought to increasingly engage in conversations with the Publics to whom much of the material culture belongs. Yet, there are 2 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 rising concerns over the production of the heritage discourse - from debates about cultural restitutions and the ethics of handling cultural belongings to conversations about misinformation, conflict and their impact on heritage conservations - that have little to do, and are even dissonant positions with local communities. One reason for this dissonance is the multifarious nature of the ‘publics’ with varying meanings in different parts of the world. Simultaneously, public communities, whose interests in protection and management of heritage places and materiality may not necessarily fall within contemporary archaeological and heritage practices, had been constantly taken as passive agents to be informed of an ‘authoritarian’ archaeological construction of the past, towards which their knowledges are sometimes extractable but not levelled in their epistemic validities. We believe that their knowledge and how they wish to manage the past, as well as the lessons they extract from it, should be subject to equanimous consideration, not patronising judgement. Societies around the world are composed of many publics, often clashing or cooperating in these fields. Archaeology, like a proverbial Sword of Damocles, hangs in the background of these conflicts, its presence and sharpness always being present in our social, cultural, and political imaginaries (Castoriadis 1997). Dogmas like ‘There Is No Alternative’ work much like Indra’s Net, obfuscating countless more just alternatives for societies to organise themselves (Fisher 2009). In an age of increasing sectarianism and nationalism, of climate crises and the risk of nuclear conflicts, many claim archaeology’s authority in their actions (Meskell, 2018), despite all national ideologies being formed through selective ideas of the past (Diaz-Andreu and Champion 1996). Rather than submitting to its role as an authority and subservient to structures of power, we show through the carefully selected contributions in this volume, that archaeology and heritage can provide for the various publics to forge their own destinies; not to merely explain the world, but to change it (Marx 1845). This volume presents eleven articles with a diverse range of thematic and geographical foci (fig.1), not only highlighting the different ways that archaeological and heritage practitioners engage with the Publics through its disciplinary history, but also by disentangling the dichotomy between the presumably wider and amorphous ‘public’ and professional archaeology. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 3 We submit that this professional archaeology is all too often conscripted to serve the ‘Authorised Heritage Discourse’ (Smith, 2006). It also serves as a recognition of the responsibility of archaeologists, like other intellectuals (Chomsky, 1967) to not merely prostrate themselves before authority given our access to knowledge-producing institutions. Our issue, Archaeology and the Publics, finds light similarities with the 1983 issue, for example on the focus of the relationship between archaeology and various forms of media. Michaelson (this volume) takes a quantitative as well as a qualitative approach understanding archaeology’s links to the public via the use of popular media. The article focuses on how Stonehenge was depicted and shown throughout the ages in Punch magazine and how this perception shifted over time in the eyes of the public. This study reveals the multiplicity of narratives found amongst the cartoons and their utility for communication by archaeologists while also diving into the debate on whether art reflects or projects our conceptions into the past, and whether cartoon authors have monopoly over these depictions. Where the 1983’s issue discusses the predominant media at the time – television and magazines – ours contains an article that speaks about the role of digital media in archaeology, in particular cyber archaeology and archaeogaming. The past, whether in its reception in the construction of ‘imagined communities’ based on factors such as ethnicity, race, class, and political affiliation (Anderson 1978). The past is also present in its absence via the occlusion of past practices informing alternative futures for communities (Wengrow and Graeber 2021) is prominent in people’s imaginations, whether it is immediately evident or not. Media and heritage are usual arenas for these expressions, from video games depicting archaeology such as Tomb Raider and Uncharted, to contested landscapes like those in Ayodhya (Bernbeck and Pollock 1994), or in Cyprus (Navarro-Yashin 2013). de Viveiros and Cruz (This Volume), for instance, demonstrated how low poly modelling gaming can provide educational tools for low-income students and users within the field of archaeology. 4 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Where the 1983’s issue discussed fringe theories, Kocsis (this volume) also discusses the engagement between science and pseudoscience in the case of T.C. Lethbridge’s legacy, and ties it to the very current misinformation debate of our own era and how it finds expression through parapsychology, folklore and local rumours, and the condemnation and disregard of the ivory tower by rogue intellectuals – and vice versa. The role of fictional archaeology and pseudoscientific work has not failed to find expression in the popular imagination even to the present day. However, as Kocsis highlighted, the appealing model of alternative knowledge production of the past framed as the ‘late antiquarian polymath’ stemmed out from the very disciplinary history of archaeology itself. It is exactly due to archaeology’s monopolistic epistemic claim to authority over knowledge production of the past that some actors can claim ‘truth’ from their own rendering of archaeology for varying agendas, including those that are adversarial, misleading, and even nefarious. The tension therefore lies in the power imbalance between the different segments of the public, and especially between archaeologists and heritage practitioners and the rest of the public, over the authority for interpretation and decision-making for heritages. More recently, archaeologists have advocated not only for more genuine engagements with the public stakeholders, but more importantly for observing an ‘epistemic humility’, as Schmidt (2018) argued, by stepping away from leadership roles, committing to power-sharing and collaborative decision-making, and respecting and learning from the communities’ own ways of creating history and ‘doing archaeology’ (Lane 2011). By establishing such ground for epistemic levelling and symmetry between the ‘scientific’ and ‘other’ knowledges of the past (Jopela & Fredriksen, 2015), that the archaeologists and heritage practitioners can fulfil their ethical responsibility to make archaeology a present-centred and future-oriented practice for the publics (Giblin, King & Smith 2014). The article by Richards et al. (this volume) illustrates this point. Coauthored with Maroon colleagues, explores climate justice, to which indigenous Caribbean groups have long determined to be vulnerable, but also holds the distinction of highlighting how Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) might be used for present and future climate change resilience. CoNovember 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 5 authoring work with communities whose archaeological heritage are the crux of archaeological studies is an excellent example of how we might bring community and our varied meanings of “Publics” to the traditional academic space of “Archaeology.” Different segments within the professionalised archaeological and heritage community also have different concerns when engaging with the broader publics. Watson (this volume) looks towards the English context of development and of commercial archaeology. Questioning the technical and often commercial approaches taken by development-led private archaeological contractors, the article focuses on the socially contingent nature that archaeological work of this sort should take, and for more human-centred approaches to evaluate existing paradigms of practice La Arqueología Social, if you will (Tantaleán, H. and Aguilar 2012). Archaeology’s role in understanding the past is often highlighted in lieu of its potential to help us understand the future. The mass repository of past lifeways and social organisations, with their contradictions and equally revolting and inspiring events and practices, can help communities today tackle these insurmountable challenges not through blind imitation, but through careful observation and critical reception. In this sense, archaeology can function much like the legendary plant Haoma in the Persian Avestas, with healing properties and invigoration. Archaeology is important as a foundation of the ideas of various national and cultural movements, and this has led to the formation of multiple publics. Often the discipline has both been complicit in the selective formation of national identities. The multiplicity of uses of archaeology is intrinsically linked to the publics. It must be acknowledged that there has been an increasing focus on subjectivities and particularities in archaeology’s critical reception of its own role in the construction of these imaginaries. In this vein, and in the tradition of Tambiah (1997), Samadder’s (this volume) article on archaeology and communities in India tackles the difficult question of subjectivities and politicised contestation of stories and artefacts 6 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 in India. The author tries through her own subjectivity as well as through the study of the case studies in the article, to show the emotional stakes that archaeology can take in the public sphere with the possibility of alternatives to often tragic results. The result is a plea for multivocality and assuming the responsibility required by archaeologists and other professionals working in history to bridge public perception and history while acknowledging the power of emotion and unscrupulous politicisation in the use of history and archaeology. Bortolan (this volume) looks at the effects of conflict on national memory in general and on the city of Babylon under US-led occupation in particular. Looking at the instrumentalisation of archaeological heritage in contexts of conflict, the article connects concepts like iconicity together with materiality to show how these sites become theatres of conflict between different publics. Similarly, Gianniri (this volume) discusses the intertwining of archaeology, politics, and local communities from a case study in Eastern Crete. Whilst archaeology has historically served colonial and nationalistic agendas in the Greek history, archaeological project with a bottom-up archaeological ethnography approach had a positive impact on the community’s identity and future in a village with a traumatic history of abandonment, by encouraging community engagement with archaeology and heritage and a construction of a more inclusive version of their past. It highlights the need for a more politically self-conscious and present-centred archaeology that can unlock multiple future possibilities from the past for the public to see and encounter. Valentina-Guerrero (this volume) takes a heart-centred approach to the topic indigenous archaeologies. The paper looks at the engagement of local communities in the SAR River in Colombia and links its importance to the struggle of those communities in the struggle against enclosure by predatory corporations. The article also serves as a reflection on how archaeologists engage with their local interlocutors and who does archaeological work benefit. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 7 Whilst archaeologists and heritage practitioners may often find themselves situated in a difficult context imbued with traumatic community experiences, sometimes the very heritage itself can be a traumatic one. Gleave (this volume) dealt with a traumatic heritage from the pollutive and productive legacies of the industrial past that has been cited to have caused the climate crisis of our own time. By examining different ‘rewilding’ strategies to integrate industrial sites into public visions of environmental sustainability, the article is an enlightening alternative reuse strategies for formerly pollutive sites to contribute to a greener future. Moxham (this volume) takes the view that decolonization work should be at the forefront of the various initiatives linked to difficult heritage. The article focuses on the theory of translational justice and its application to working with various stakeholders linked to difficult heritage, with particular note to that of the ‘translator’ and their own agency on such matters. The Publics therefore reintroduces a conversation that does not necessarily adhere to hyper-diffusionism. In moving away from conservative ideas of human innovation, we also therefore come to understand that the environment shapes human culture and civilization, and so the physical natural environment must also be understood - embraced even - in any archaeological inquiry. The advent of the Internet, the resultant multiplicity of medias, and the wave of misinformation and pseudoscience that this has brought has led to a sort of universal pessimism with regard to grand narratives and unifying theories – “What was to be the value of the long looked forward to,/ Long hope for calm, the autumnal serenity/ And the wisdom of age?” (Eliot, 2023) The Publics hints that this is not necessarily a bad thing. To be clear, misinformation and pseudoscience is never good, but what does happen is that scientists and scholars must now make their positions and their ideas for clear to the publics, and so are no longer able to comfortably sit in the ivory tower and conduct their experiments - if that was their inclination. For archaeology, of course, the ground is even more treacherous. Our ambition to make archaeology more scientific has made it more correct and has allowed us to make more robust statements about human life, without question. 8 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Nevertheless, we are still confronted with the reality that none of our theories are genuinely falsifiable. In admitting this to our publics, we do not admit that everything or anything is true as a result, but we do come to - have to - embrace new and other ideas. Social constructs such as race (Lydon and Rizvi 2016), class (Bourdieu 2016), and gender (Moore 2012) have unconsciously informed previous archaeological practice. It is our submission that considerations of these and other ideas must now inform current narratives - consciously. What will the next 40 years look like for the relationship between archaeology and the multivocal publics, of which the archaeologists and heritage practitioners are part of? It is difficult to assess what type of archaeology will emerge when equally fundamental reconsiderations are repeated from other points of view – Hodder The answers are many, but surely it will not be the stories of distancing, seclusion, and monopoly over the knowledge production of the past as it had been seen in the history of the discipline. In an era of polycrisis, the knowledge of the past is becoming not less but more and more important for future solutions, by providing baseline data for long-term environmental change, past examples of resilience building to inspire future adaptational strategies, and alternative historical narratives that contribute towards postcolonial transitional justice and community empowerment. Disentangling the blurry lines between heritage practitioners and the many public stakeholders, by epistemic levelling and genuine engagement with the Indigenous and local communities, by re-politicising and reorienting the focus of archaeology to the present and future, and by democratising the academia, is critical to tackling myriads of unfolding challenges. Similar to the productive and pollutive industrial heritage, archaeology, the acclaimed authority of which had been coerced in licensing nationalistic, colonial, and other prejudicial historical narratives, also needs a rewilding from an exclusive garden on the ivory tower into a full biome where critical conversations and empowering engagements may grow to bring positive changes and even radical alternatives for a better future. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 9 10 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 1. Map of all locations discussed in the volume: 1) Kocsis, 2) Gianniri, 3) Watson, 4) Richards et al., 5) Gleave, 6) de Viveiros Pina & Cruz, 7) Michaelson, 8) Bortolan, 9) Moxham, 10) Gonzalez, 11) Samadder References Anderson, B. 2016. Imagined Communities. Verso Books. Bailey, G. 2000. Human Ecodynamics. Oxford: Oxbow. Bernbeck, R., and Pollock, S. 1996.. Ayodhya, Archaeology, and Identity. 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November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 13 Ghosts of Archaeology: The Journey of Archaeological Knowledge from Science to Science Fiction Andrea Kocsis Northeastern University London [email protected] Abstract The paper aims to evaluate the boundaries between science and pseudo-science in the public understanding of archaeology. It uses the legacy of T.C. Lethbridge as a case study to illustrate the process of transitioning from a scientific to a pseudo-scientific realm. It establishes the relationship between Lethbridge and the academic community based on archival documents, while it aims to glimpse the parapsychological communities’ narratives by the distant reading of dowsing forums, using data parsing and topic modelling techniques. The paper claims that the role Lethbridge represented as the late antiquarian polymath, opposing the institutionalisation and processual methods of archaeology, is still an appealing model for some members of the public, who prefer interacting with the local past outside the institutional formulas of professional archaeology. However, Lethbridge’s rediscovery in the parapsychological world carries the danger that an outdated version of archaeology is becoming reinforced in times when misinformation is a global challenge. Introduction The paper aims to evaluate the fine line between science and pseudoscience in the public understanding of archaeological work. It uses the legacy of T.C. Lethbridge (1901-1971) as a case study to illustrate the process of transitioning from a scientific to a pseudo-scientific realm. Several examples demonstrate that archaeological heritage can be easily nationalised by the public or appropriated by predatory identities, however, it is less researched how easily it slips the border between the academic and non-academic spheres of knowledge production, giving space for esoteric interpretations. 14 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Although this paper is not T.C. Lethbridge’s biography, his case serves as an excellent example as it illustrates both sides of the same coin. On the one hand, originally a self-made archaeologist at the Museum of Archaeology and Ethnography in Cambridge, he became a hero of the parapsychological audience. On the other hand, how Lethbridge fell out of academic circles demonstrates the struggles and insecurities the field faced in the middle of the 20th century. This era was the time when archaeology as a profession solidified, but there were individuals involved in it who still carried characteristics from the antiquarian past, making its disciplinary boundaries blurred. Therefore, this fuzziness helped the esoteric communities to find their theorists more easily in archaeology, such as Margaret Murray, who became the “grandmother of Wicca’. Lethbridge became a grandfather figure for parapsychologist communities while losing his academic credibility. How can we track this process? Where are the limits of academic interpretation and uncertainty? How do parapsychologist communities relate to archaeology? My research aims to answer these questions with the help of a combination of archival research and digital humanities methods. I established the relationship between Lethbridge and the academic community based on archival documents, his personal correspondence and manuscripts, while I researched the parapsychological communities’ narratives by the distant reading of forums, reviews, blogs, and non-academic publications, using data parsing and topic modelling techniques. As I wanted to examine the spectrum from science to fiction in archaeology, I chose a public sitting between the two communities: archaeological dowsers. Dowsing is the practice of using forked sticks or similar tools to find water and other substances. Parapsychology has yet to prove the efficiency of dowsing, and regarding archaeology, how we relate to dowsing is not absolute either (cf. Finneran 2003). While in the UK, the practice is mostly harmless due to the success of the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS) and the Treasure Act, there are parts of the world where it is an element of the living tradition, hence more or less well-regarded. There are also some places where it is attached to conflicts between nationalistic or political groups and professional archaeology, such as Hungary, where questioning academic credibility is a political statement for November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 15 archaeological dowsers. This article is not about deciding what value we attribute to archaeological dowsing, however, it points out some of its elements that conflict with academic archaeological practice. The main focus is on how Lethbridge’s case study illustrates what happens when archaeologists do not accept not having all the answers, as it carries the risk of losing control both over academic integrity and public understanding. Nevertheless, we must first understand T.C. Lethrbrige’s role in this case study. The internet barely knows him, despite the significant influence his work on pendulum had on those using dowsing methods. As pseudo-scientific references are not the most meticulous, it is unsurprising that his teachings are inherited without being linked to his name. The most notable reference to him is in the pseudo-science parody publication Sex Secrets of Ancient Atlantis, mentioning the characters always having a Lethbridge edition in their pockets (Grant 2004). Otherwise, the handful of Google hits about him is primarily second-hand bookshops still storing his publications or his newer biographies written by parapsychologists and followers (Welbourn 2011, Graves - Hoult 1980). But who was T.C.Lethrbidge? In and out of the 'Ivory Tower' This article cannot completely introduce Lethbridge as a person or provide a full biographic overview. According to his widow, Nina, editor of his autobiography’s manuscript, he was a great entertainer and never ran out of conversation topics (Lethbridge 19891). Within these pages, we can focus only on the conflict of his leaving the Cambridge archaeology scene, which is a rich story illustrating the process of the professional discipline turning its back to the residue of an antiquarian past. However, as it can fill the pages of a monograph in preparation, here we have to sample representative steps of 1 Posthumous publication by Mina Lethbridge. 16 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 this journey. Lethbridge, born in 1901, came from an aristocratic family and studied natural sciences at Cambridge with little enthusiasm. As he spent time at the Museum of Archaeology and Ethnography (today MAA), Louis Clarke, curator, befriended him. Along with Cyril Fox2, he introduced the young Tom to archaeological digs. Despite never having a formal archaeological education, he became the Honorary Keeper of the Museum of Archaeology and Ethnography (see Lethbridge 1989). He did not receive a salary in this position but participated in archaeological excavations and published their results. He was never formally associated with the predecessors of the Department of Archaeology, but he was part of a circle of elite academics based in Cambridge. It gave him the means, supported by the Cambridge Antiquarian Society, to be involved in the archaeological works in the area, such as Waterbeech, Burwell, Fen Ditton, and Sohan (e.g. Lethbridge 1924, 1927, 1933, 1936a). He excavated a variety of periods but was most interested in Anglo-Saxon cemeteries (Lethbridge 1931). However, his approaches and methodology were reminiscent of an unstructured time of the profession, where diversification and specialisation did not yet exist. Practitioners in this era aimed to be experts in everything: material culture, history, linguistics, osteology, archaeozoology, and anthropology, while being knowledgeable in cultures from the Bronze Age to the Mediaeval periods of the British Isles and overseas.3 Lethbridge called these 2 Cyril Fox was the first receiving a PhD for Archaeological work in England for his work on The Archaeology of the Cambridge Region. 3 Being a general practitioner necessarily led to some misinformation. For example, Lethbridge used craniology to tell the age, ethnic group, and origin of a skeleton: “They were certainly not Anglo-Saxons, who would have what is known as a “coffin-shaped” skull.”(...) “If you have a good eye for the shapes of things and a reasonable memory also, it is not difficult to get a working knowledge of the types of human skull found in Britain. (Lethbridge 1989:35). November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 17 times, passing the 19th-century digs but not joining the institutionalisation of archaeology yet, “The Golden Age of Archaeology” (Lethbridge 1989: 2). As he put it, ”That age had completely passed and been superseded by one of perhaps not very enthralling technology.” (Lethbridge, 1989: 2). However, I prefer to title it ‘late antiquarianism’ and consider it a practice, not an era. While archaeology was already an established discipline in the middle of the 20th century, some people following an earlier practice still were active in the field. Shift in paradigms does not necessarily mean that schools of thought consecutively follow each other without overlapping as multiple generations of researchers work alongside each other within the same disciplinary network. In this case study, I consider Lethbridge as an example practitioner of this tradition, which was one of the reasons for the conflict between him and the established archaeology. I also argue that these methods are closer and more available to the current pseudo-scientific public than publications, technologies and practices of academic archaeology, making these ostracised authors, like Lethbridge, an accessible reference point for understanding or misunderstanding the profession. What did this late antiquarian practice consist of? Social class was an essential element of how archaeology functioned in what Lethbridge calls “the Golden Age”. Archaeology was a hobby rather than a job and did not necessarily rely on salaries. In Lethbridge’s words, “If you had enough money to live on, and your main driving force was curiosity rather than restless ambition, archaeology was a great life in the Golden Age” (Lethbridge 1989:3). It also meant that elitism was an inherent part of the picture: “Once paid posts began to become common, of course, the Golden Age was doomed.” In an elitist outburst against professional archaeology, Lethbridge continued: “If you make men all equal, you destroy originality.” (Lethbridge 1989: 99). However, it also points out another important feature of late antiquarianist practice, which played the most crucial part in Lethbridge’s career: the emphasis on imagination. “So, with some first-hand knowledge, a great mass of varied information and an independent outlook, the old dons [Golden Age archaeologists] could use observation and inherent probability in their imagination to solve many problems, which are much more difficult today.” 18 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 (Lethbridge 1989:47) Lethbridge stated. “It [Imagination] was the magic key, which he used to open the door into the past”. One of the examples of his imaginative interpretation is an anecdote from the excavations of the Christian Saxon cemetery at Shrudy Camps (Lethbridge 1936). There, among the skeletons, he thought to identify a gambler cheating in a game, leading to his murder based only on a collection of objects. 4However, Lethbridge was unwilling to recognise that in professional archaeology, the interrogation and interpretation of data can speak without substituting it with vivid imagination. His close friends maintained the epistemic bubble around him, reinforcing his approaches.5 For example, in letters exchanged with James Whittaker, a London-based publisher, they agreed to favour amateurism over professionalism. As Whittaker complained: “Ah how right you are in the scathing remarks you pass upon Universities and teachers and the rest of that crap.” (Whittaker 1951: 66). The resistance against institutionalisation and professionalism led to his ultimate break with Cambridge archaeology over his theory about the Gogmagog giants. In 1956, he claimed to identify chalk giant deities on Wandlebury Hill and interpreted them as proof of the presence of Celtic religion in Cambridgeshire (Lethbridge 1957a). To outline the chalk figures rumoured by locals (cf. Meadows 2015), he and his wife used sounding bars to indicate the change in chalk (Fig. 1). A method against which he was warned by fellow archaeologist Christopher Hawkes: “The probing method adopted by Mr. Lethbridge (...) has been regarded by my colleagues with suspicion. The fact is that this method on chalk sites is mistrusted by almost all modern professional British 4 “I said, looking at a collection of objects, which resembled ratafias. Those are playing-men from a game (...) The men in question had cheated evidently with dice, (and) was loaded with an iron pin.” (Lethbridge 1989:47) 5 His letters reveal who his close friends were as they used nicknames for the Cambridge archaeology and museum scene amongst each other. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 19 Archaeologists. Their mistrust of it is very understandable since it is certainly not reliable on chalk sites of the sort that such archaeologists normally examine. The probing method would probably lead, as it did in fact lead, to suspicion of his digging.” (Hawkes 1957:2) However, Lethbridge did not acknowledge the limitations of his excavation: “It was the recognised method of looking for lost field drains and similar things in the country. All kinds of excuses have been thought of by archaeologists for not using such an obvious aid to research” (Lethbridge 1957a: 4-5). In the end, a scrutiny panel of experts in chalk archaeology and geology rejected his Figure1. T.C. and Mina Lethbridge probing the chalk on Wandlebury Hill. London Evening News, 18 Nov. 1954, p.4. Newscuttings on Gogmagog. giants at Wandlebury, 1954-1957, GBR/0012/MS Add.9777/26/7/25-34. Cambridge University Library.] 20 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 findings, determining the outlines as glacial marks (Grimes 1957)6 and future excavations did not verify his theory either (cf. French et al. 2004). Despite the scientific disapproval and warnings from the head of the Cambridge Preservation Trust (Willink 1956: 310)7, his theory was published and circulated in the media (e.g., Cambridge Evening News, The London Evening News, BBC, etc.), giving us a good insight into the public reception of the pseudo-discovery. The press welcomed it as a sensation, but the professional reviews of his book (Lethbridge 1957b) were devastating, as they compared Lethbridge to Schliemann. (Anon 1957a). Lethbridge could not tolerate that his progressed approaches were not welcome in the professional setting of Cambridge archaeology. He moved to Devon, where, in some sense, he continued antiquarianism for a different public. Turning to parasychology In his archaeological practice, Lethbridge gave much credit to folklore and local rumours, which already provided him with a good connection to the public. Furthermore, the letters and positive feedback to the Gogmagog publications from esoteric practitioners could have indicated an affirmation of a new, acceptive and welcoming audience8, helping him to find his way 6 “I have to confess that we [Grimes, Piggott and Cornwall] feel unable to support your views. Apart from the archaeological difficulties, Cornwall’s analyses indicate that the fillings (apart from that in the grey pit) are not the result of human activity, but essentially natural in character; and with other features suggest that the phenomena as a whole are due to solification processes. I know you disapprove of these ideas, but there it is.” (Grimes 1957) 7 “Would it not be the best to restrain to the utmost possible degree all publicity? Would it not be best in matter which is clearly very controversial to proceed by the method of a paper published by yourself in the appropriate archaeological journal?” (Willink 1956: 310) 8 Such as the one from Mrs M.E.Hone, an astrologist from West Wittering who was interested in “Sun-and-Moon religion” (Hone 1957:171). November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 21 into extrasensory perception (ESP9) (cf. Lethbridge 1965). He published the ideological background of his Gogmagog theory for this new audience in 1962 (Lethbridge 1962), but the real jump was immersing in dowsing. There is no room here to discuss the history of British dowsing or Lethbridge’s personal history with dowsing either (for those, see Graves 1980 and Finneran 2003). However, he supported the method even in Cambridge while working on excavations: “Dowsing is quite efficient in some cases; although frowned upon by the too conventional type of archaeologists, who, knowing little of science, describes it as ‘unscientific’. For those who fear the opprobrium of these old ladies of archaeology, electrical gadgets are available, which perform the same function at greater expense.”(Lethbridge 1957a: 9). In his Devon garden, he further experimented with the forked sticks. After a local woman, referred to as a “witch” (Wilson 1980: xi), recommended he use a pendulum instead of dowsing sticks, Lethbridge dedicated experiments to establish how the pendulum reacts at different lengths (Lethbridge 1976). His recommendations still circulate online (Fig.2). The posts refer to Lethbridge’s journey from pendulums (see published Lethbridge 1976) to chasing ghosts, as he claimed to find the dimension of paranormal phenomena using the pendulum at a given length (Lethbridge 1961). As an extremely prolific writer, he published several short books almost annually on these pendulum techniques (1963, 1965, 1967, 1976) and the dimension of ghosts and ghouls (1961, 1963). Yet he did not stop there but ventured further into imagination by exploring the possibilities of alien intervention in ancient history (Lethbridge 1972).10 9 Extra Sensory Perseption or ESP for short, is an angle of parapsychology interested in perception without using phisical senses, experimental exploration of a six sense. 10 An idea which gained great popularity as a result of Eric von Däniken’s books at that time. Cf. (Wilson 1980). 22 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 2. Screenshot of a Forteana forum discussion about the uses of the pendulum. Source: https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/t-c-lethbridge-dowsing.35840/. Accessed: 16:43 1 May 2023. Dowsing forums: What the public sees Professional archaeologists have been researching the alternative realm for decades, however, these studies mainly focused on the US (cf. Williams 1991, Harrold - Eve 1995, Shermer 1997, Sagan 1997, Feder 2002, Schadla-Hall 2004, 2006, or most recently Moshenska 2017). I aimed to glimpse British alternative practices by examining the British dowsing community’s online discussion. Lethbridge's ideas were transmitted to British dowsing primarily via Tom Graves, who first edited Lethbridge's parapsychological work and himself published several volumes on archaeological dowsing (Graves - Hoult 1980, Graves 1980). To establish how archaeological dowsers feel about professional archaeology, I have analysed all the available 281 posts on the British Dowsing Forum’s Archaeology “Go out and find stuff much?” and “Archeo-dowsing” November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 23 sections. Although the forum is not the main communication channel anymore for the community, as the posts ranged from 2006 to 2022 and users read these feeds 258512 times, it could give a solid longitudinal look into the discussion. Firstly, I conducted an LDA (Latent Dirichlet Allocation) topic modelling on the collected posts to see the overarching debate. LDA works by assuming that each document in the collection - in our case, forum posts - comprises a combination of different themes (topics), and each topic is represented by a set of keywords that commonly occur together (see Blei et al. 2003). From these keywords, the researcher can reconstruct the main themes of the discussion. Secondly, I closely read the topics, supplemented by netnographic participant observation of relevant social media groups, to discover intersections between the narratives of the forum and the late antiquarian practices discussed above. The investigation aimed to see if the practices represented by Lethbridge have an impact on contemporary archaeological dowsing discussions. The four main topics the LDA modelling discovered were: the community aspect of dowsing(1), the debates around the destructive and non-destructive approaches(2), reporting vs. selling finds(3), and the technicalities of dowsing(4) (Table 1). Topic Keywords (bi-gram tokens, lemmatised) Representative Post Topic 1: Community aspects of dowsing vs. discovery Group event, go group, individually part, rods go, social group, part social, location get, reaction rods, group rather, get reaction, rather individually, nice location, spur moment, reputation dowser, nothing back “Dowsers seem to go out in groups, rather than individually, as part of a social groupevent to a nice location, get a few reactions from their rods and then go home" 24 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Topic Keywords (bi-gram tokens, lemmatised) Representative Post Topic 2: Destructive vs. Take spade, could destroy, non-destructive mood trench, would wrong, spade unless, unless train, setting dig, wrong encourage, make discoveries, trench could, discoveries take, hole want, train archaeologist, archaeologist setting, go along, dig big, trench archaeology “Just setting to and digging a mighty big hole or if you want to get in the mood, a trench, could be destroying history.” Topic 3: Reporting vs. Selling Detector enthusiast, dowser archaeologist, find object, get welly, structure exist, country often, encounter metal, believe opportunity, detector people, people search, search field, opportunity sell, finance reward, many search, object gain, find motivate, motivate many, gain financial, sell find “I don't know of any professional dowsing archaeologists and certainly there is not a great deal of money to be made out of dowsing archaeology. Even archaeologists are not well paid unless they are at the top of their league.” Topic 4: Technicalities of Metal detectorist, archaedowsing ological dowser, code conduct, dowse today, king stone, many things, dowse around, san louise, ring true, gold dust, land owner, dowser find, thing keep, dowser work, would damage, go alone, gold find, rare mineral, robbery take, dowser could “He has a device which electronically records the swing of a dowsing rod, similar to an L-rod and combines it with GPS data, stores it all on a laptop with custom-built software which can plot where he's walked, similar to a GPS "track" but with a colour representation showing which way the rod was swinging at each point along the way.” Table 1 showing the topic keywords of the four identified topics. Andrea Kocsis. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 25 As topics 2 and 3 discussed the problems the late antiquarianist practice was concerned about, I close read the posts in these two corpora. The main link between the two ideologies was balancing being on the fringe while wishing to work in the mainstream due to the firm belief in the method. Within these posts, the voice of those advocating not excavating alone but only in collaboration with archaeologists to avoid “destroying history” was strong (Post no.1839). For example, post no. 1841 emphasises the vision of dowsing as helping archaeological excavations while keeping it as a hobby: “I think that possibly there is a different approach between the metal detectors and the dowsing archaeologist in that the metal detectors are finding things for commercial reasons or just for a hobby whereas a the dowsing archaeologist is doing it to gain information, to aid an archaeology dig whilst also doing it as a hobby. I don't know of any professional dowsing archaeologists and certainly there is not a great deal of money to be made out of dowsing archaeology. Even archaeologists are not well paid unless they are at the top of their league.” (Post no.1841) Forumers even gave tips on where dowsing help might be needed in professional settings: ”Might be a good thing to dowse Flag Fen and point the Archaeology folks in the right direction, so less ground is covered/searched, it's a win-win situation for them, they don't spend time on empty ground, and all the goodies are found” (Post no. 1471). Similarly to the views represented by Lethbridge, these narratives discredit the advancements of archaeological technology and methods to which they have no access. The second link was the easy accessibility of low-quality information. While for the late antiquarianist practice, it meant the lack of proper peerreview and reliance on folklore, today's amateur archaeologists rely on nonedited online information: "I hate technology, but look at what it does for us, good and bad. I love to read, but going to the Library or Book Store is not something I do much anymore. But, now with the internet I can just type something and find history, ancient sites, pictures, blogs, etc.” (Post. no. 20856). The low-quality resources also come with a sea of misinformation, such as “I’m sure the Pyramids at Giza date to a very early time, parts of the complex date to 10500 years ago, but now I believe some of the Giza complex 26 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 date many thousands of years before that, it’s a huge building site that has seen Pyramids erected over many thousands of years I believe, probing the treasure close to the main Pyramids point to this being the case. I know most books refer to the Pyramids being less than 5000 years old, well for me you have to go back MUCH further in time, with the Sphinx being youngest in that grouping.” (Post no. 4824). The third link was hostility against the institutionalised practice: “[Until] who(...) can dowse themselves is allowed to explore sites with this open mind and NOT what he learnt in Oxford or Cambridge history books, then dowsing will always be looked down on” (Post. no. 12629). Interestingly, while for the late antiquarianism, professionalisation meant a step away from elitism, today, university education implies a form of intellectual elite to show hostility against. These themes resonate well with what Moshenska defined as the factors that “make alternative archaeologies alternative” (Moshenska 2017:123). These are the rejection of scholarly rigour, embracing or fighting the outsider status, and claiming fuzzy boundaries between the two realms. While it would be possible to further study the online discussion on archaeological dowsing, these excerpts demonstrate that despite the changing circumstances, the inheritors of Lethbridge’s practices are still in the same shoes as half a century ago due to being stuck on the fringe. While the users did not talk about Lethbridge per se, they reproduced the discourse he was a firm representative of. Lessons from Lethbridge Lethbridge found his audience by journeying from science to pseudoscientific realms. What can we learn from his story as professional archaeologists? I found two components which helped his communication: his storytelling techniques mimicking historical and fantasy fiction and his connection to local communities. On the flip side, his story demonstrates pitfalls archaeologists should beware of. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 27 Storytelling Professional methods might sound as realistic as dowsing rods for the eyes not used to stratigraphy or being wary of the technology behind geophysics. Until the answer to the “but how do you know this?” question is “the consistency of the soil changed”, paranormal explanations will always be more appealing. Especially with the boom of the fantasy genre in popular culture, ghosts and ghouls might be sexier than pottery fragments. Pyburn has recognised it in her thought-provoking manifesto in which she rang the alarm on perpetuating the “Indiana Jones” image of archaeology (2008). In this essay, although she correctly criticised the hype around archaeological sensation, she did not provide an alternative model which could be competing for public attention. Very early, Lethbridge recognised the need for the extraordinary, the mystical, and the story behind the amateur interest in archaeology: “The trouble is that, to an amateur, the whole thing is a fascinating interest. To a professional, it is his bread and butter.” (Lethbridge 1989:49.). The contemporary press reinforced his ideas, as there was a continuous interest in his Gogmagog story despite the academic debates in its background (Anon 1957b). The trouble with uncontrolled storytelling is that it easily leads to misinterpretation, enabling political abuse of the past (see, e.g. Höfig, V. 2020, Kim, D. 2019). As the tangibility of archaeology makes it more prominent and confrontational than pseudo-history, archaeologists have to carry this responsibility of interpretation. Nonetheless, I claim that interpretation is a spectrum which enables us to tell an authentic story. The aim is to find the delicate balance between when to let professional accuracy go for public authenticity: what interpretation will enable the story element but not harm the professionalism . However, there 28 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 is a point with which professionalism11 cannot compete: magic, the element leading from science to fiction. Is there a way to professionalise magic? Communities There might be a way towards magic: initiation into the profession's secret, the rite of passage. When we talk about community archaeology scholarly, we mostly mean scenarios when indigenous groups gain control over their own past in a post-colonial context (cf. Marshall 2002). However, most community archaeology projects in Britain are exchanges between experts and locals, in which the locals are still mostly actors but not directors. In contrast, the dowsers are their own managers and have the right to plan, execute and interpret their research. Anyone can be a superhero without the need to go through institutional training. A single dowser also manifests multiple players in an excavation: non-intrusive researchers (like geophysicists, geoinformatics specialists, and surveyors), archaeological technicians and archaeologists. The merge of these roles in one person invokes those late antiquarian practices the study represented via Lethbridge. However, gaining all the control and the full understanding of the process is not a practice in today's professional archaeology, as it is highly specialised and diversified, turning archaeology into a highly skilled profession from a DIY hobby. Therefore, the best practices to bridge the professional and amateur realms might be those community projects that actively demonstrate that professional participation is not exclusive but rather teamwork (for an exciting early example, see Chippindale 1990). Lethbridge respected - although he gave too much credit to - local knowledge, which led to being able to write about subjects the audience was interested in. He was concerned about the practice of bringing archaeology 11 Scholars working on the historical misinformation in video games have already established models for it (see Kapell - Elliot 2013). November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 29 close to the locals. For example, when he complained about museum displays: “The Saffron Walden Museum had a number of local things in it of considerable interest to a wider range of students than those in the immediate neighbourhood (Lethbridge 1989: 96). I might consider Lethbridge “the man he saw the future”, quoting the title of his biography written from a parapsychologist's point of view, but for a different reason than the parapsychologist community does (Welbourn 2011). He understood something crucial about communicating with the local audience through stories (cf. Holloway - Klevnas 2007). These are pavements of scientific communication, museum outreach and engagement today. The pitfalls It does not mean, however, that it would be wise to rehabilitate Lethbridge fully. We must acknowledge his role in spreading misinformation - Finneran directly compares him to Däniken, the too widely-read author propagating pseudoscience about extraterrestrial influences on early human culture (2003). The trend of selling fictional archaeology to the public is as popular as ever, as the debate surrounding the recent Netflix show, Ancient Apocalypse, indicates (see Heritage 2022). Common pseudoscience patterns appear both in alternative archaeological practices and in Lethbridge’s work. These are building on anecdotal evidence, not using control groups, cherry-picking data to match preconceptions, and not testing hypotheses. Lethbridge was not willing to accept that the meticulous excavation methodology and documentation procedure being developed during the dusk of his career had been serving as a control to the ego of the archaeologist. As archaeological research is intrusive and hence not reproducible, it must be executed based on systematic sampling and strict documentation after careful planning to remain scientific. As a consequence, selecting what to excavate is crucial for preserving information. This responsibility divides amateur and professional archaeology. The meticulous documentation, trusting specialisation, careful interrogation of data, and peer review, all to which Lethbridge was a laud opposition, should lead to omitting unsupportable theories. Letting preconceptions go is a painful process that 30 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 kills the creativity that Lethbridge and some other archaeologists worldwide were unwilling to part with. Nonetheless, it ensures that the stories the artefacts tell the public ring true. Conclusions Although Lethbridge stood in the centre of the study, I claimed that not only his restless and imaginative personality was responsible for his shift between scientific and pseudo-scientific realms but also the institutionalisation of archaeology, which provided a route for stricter methodology and peer review. I argued that the role Lethbridge represented as the late antiquarian polymath is still an appealing model for some members of the public, who prefer interacting with the local past outside the institutional formulas of professional archaeology. The imaginative component, the DIY approach, and the humour of his writing can make his books more appealing than peer-reviewed publications locked behind paywalls when searching for local history. 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Klairi Gianniri National & Kapodistrian University of Athens [email protected] Abstract Archaeology, as it is known and being practiced in the West, often played a significant role in promoting colonial and nationalistic agendas. Although the colonial heritage of the discipline and its neocolonial present have been exposed and critiqued, the vast majority of archaeologists do not seem to be fully conscious that archaeology acts politically at various scales. Thus, politics in archaeology is usually associated with grand national narratives, rather than relationship networks in a local or community context. As a result, studying the way a small community is being affected by archaeological research is often considered to be of secondary importance, even though such activity carries profound political effects and implications. This paper aims to shed light on these implications through a case study at the mountainous areas of East Crete, where the utilisation of archaeological ethnography highlighted the role of archaeology as a mediator of the collective past and contested present. Introduction Over recent decades, the role of archaeology in politics, and politics in archaeology has been the subject of intensive research (Lennox and Richardson 2016; see also Bense 1998; Doeser 2008; Hamilakis and Duke 2007; Kohl 1998; McGuire 2008; Meskell 2002; Perring and Van der Linde 2009; Trigger 1984). It is now increasingly realised that archaeology, as it is known and being practiced in the West, often played a significant role in promoting colonial and nationalistic agendas. Even though the colonial heritage of the discipline and its neocolonial present have been exposed and critiqued, the vast majority of November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 35 archaeologists do not seem to be fully conscious of archaeology’s multilevel influence, especially in the countries that can be characterised as cryptocolonies. Such countries are nominally independent, but that independence comes at the price of a sometimes humiliating form of effective dependence (Herzfeld 2002, 2020: xviii-xx). Greece, in particular, provides such an example, offering a complex case where colonialism and nationalism have worked in unison to shape the contours of Greek archaeology (Hamilakis 2008: 274, 2016). Since the establishment of the Greek State at the end of the 19th century, archaeology has been the principal means of constitution of the national narrative (Plantzos 2008). Greek archaeologists worked to ‘purify’ national monuments, wishing to emphasise the national, emblematic character required by Greeks as the foundation of their national identity (Valavanis 2007: 13). Their effort to turn a historical narrative of ellipses into one of continuities left neither the monuments nor the landscape untouched. In this newly reconstructed Hellenic landscape, there were no cities or villages. The ethnographic and the picturesque were concealed, perhaps because they would provide too painful reminders of the struggles and violence of the present (Mazower 2008: 33-38). By vanishing the aspects of everyday life from the archaeological landscape, despite that not only the ancient past but also the rural life of the contemporary Hellenes was a source of authenticity for the Greek formulation (Herzfeld 2020: xvi), archaeology turned the past into a sacred relic and placed itself in the position of its administrator. This alienation of both archaeology and cultural heritage at large continued tirelessly until recent years, whereas rural intangible heritage is documented mainly by folklore studies to promote a unified national narrative (Herzfeld 2003: 304; see also Dragouni and Lekakis 2023). A significant paradigm shift emerged during the past thirty years, due to certain developments, such as the spread of field surveys, industrial archaeology, ethnoarchaeology and the boom in museology, which led the discipline to sponsor a much wider and more inclusive conception of the past than it once did (Mazower 2008: 39; see also Hodder 2003). Thus questions about the identity, the meaning and the role of archaeology, its dependence 36 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 on the state, its relationship to the public (Preucel and Mrozowski 2010: 36), gradually began to be part of the traditional archaeological research. Despite this remarkable transition, the development of archaeology as an academic subject across the world usually catches the public’s eye for the wrong reasons, while the great majority of it relates archaeology primarily to the distant past. This tendency can be thoroughly comprehended if one considers the way archaeological heritage is being often treated by professionals up to date. In most cases, archaeologists are unaware of the impact of their work on the local communities and its effect on their life (Dragouni and Lekakis 2023; Hodder 2003). In addition, archaeological heritage is usually mistreated to serve political agendas and its management does not meet the contemporary political, social and economic issues that the society faces. Furthermore, it often goes unnoticed that politics and archaeology go beyond grand narratives of nationhood, and extend into everyday matters, such as relatively small but vital functions of a local community (Lennox and Richardson 2016). The above issues, that arise when archaeology moves into the real world of economic conflict and political struggle (Ascherson 2000: 2) will be discussed in this paper, which is based on my doctoral research1 (Gianniri 2022) in the remote community of Anatoli village in Eastern Crete2. Crete, in general, is of special interest, due to the influence of the ‘Minoan’ archaeology in the identity formation of the local people, who are treated either as the ‘fallen from grace’ and thus unworthy descendants of the ‘Minoan’ past or as the subjects of patronising ethnic reconciliation experiments (Hamilakis 2006). In particular, through the presentation of the case study of Anatoli, the 1 The doctoral research entitled Archaeology as a means to empower remote communities: the case study of mountainous Crete was supervised by Assistant Professor Marlen Mouliou (University of Athens). 2 In the wider area of the village, the interdisciplinary project Excavation, study and publication of the Minoan building at Gaidourofas in Anatoli, Hierapetra of the University of Athens (Papadatos and Kalantzopoulou 2022; Papadatos and Chalikias 2019) under the direction of Professor Yiannis Papadatos (University of Athens) takes place since 2012. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 37 utilisation of archaeological ethnography within an archaeological project, the ethics of an archaeological project and the ways it is impacting the local community, the political agendas of the various stakeholders involved in the research work, the perception of their local communities about their cultural heritage and their identity and the role of the researcher as a mediator of the collective past and contested present, will be explored. Case Study Anatoli is a mountain settlement, situated within the wider area of Hierapetra in South Eastern Crete (fig.1). The village lies on the foothills of Dikti Mountain range, at an altitude of 600 meters, overlooking the Libyan sea (fig. 2). Its location is privileged and offers an outstanding climate for human living, but it lacks significant water resources and its flat land lies by the sea, in a highly arid area, unsuitable for intensive cultivation. However, despite the limited capacity for agricultural development, until the late 1960s, Anatoli used to be a thriving village of approximately 1200 inhabitants, bursting with life, undeterred by the dry conditions that dominated throughout the year. Due to the limited agricultural production, the vast majority of the residents were employed as workers in other villages and just a few of them managed to earn a satisfactory income from the trade of olives, almonds and carobs that were produced in the land around the village. A drastic change occurred in the 1970s when Anatoli was abandoned rather suddenly, as a result of the expansion of greenhouse vegetable cultivation in the Hierapetra plain (fig. 3). The formerly unsuitable for cultivation coastal land acquired value and generated great profits for the people of Anatoli, who began to relocate to the lowland in order to work exclusively in the production of greenhouse vegetable crops. Consequently, they established the settlement of New Anatoli, whose population progressively surpassed the population of the maternal village in less than a decade (Table 1). As a result, nowadays, the population of Anatoli consists of only 80, almost 38 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 1. The position of Anatoli on the map of Crete (photograph by Google Earth). Figure 2. Photo of the settlement of Anatoli village (reproduced with permission of Sotiris November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 39 Figure 3. Photo of the greenhouses at Hierapetra plain (reproduced with permission of Sotiris Tsiganos). exclusively overaged, inhabitants. The village shows clear signs of decline, as evidenced by the abandoned and decayed houses, which haunt both those who remained and those who left, while the young generation is gradually abolishing its connections with the village and its identity. Multilayered indications of contestation and conflict are written both into the landscape and the community’s collective identity. Anatoli was turning into an oblivion society up until 2012 when the archaeological excavations of the University of Athens in three neighbouring mountain sites shook things up. The ‘invasion’ of a large group of young students and researchers, who were staying for almost three months every year in the village, affected considerably not only the pace of the village’s life but also the aspirations of the inhabitants about the future of their small community. That realisation came as both a pleasant surprise and a concern about the new role that the archaeological team had to take over. Methodology To address the issues related to the dynamics between the local community 40 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Table 1. The population change of Anatoli and New Anatoli (EΕΤΑΑ 2023). and archaeology and how this relationship can influence the shaping of the community’s identity and its relation with the past, but also to explore whether there is a bottom-up decolonial way to approach and empower the local community, an archaeological ethnography project was introduced in 2016, as a part of the archaeological project in Anatoli village. Archaeological ethnography was selected as the most suitable method, because of its ability to open a shared, trans-cultural space of co-existences and interactions among people and communities of diverse origins and backgrounds (Hamilakis and Anagnostopoulos 2009; Hamilakis 2016; Shankland 1999). Moreover, ethnography operated as an interpretive tool that contributed to the composition of a horizontal stratigraphy of the host environment and provided a clear-cut understanding of how archaeological discourse interrelates with personal experiences and memory practices. The ethnographical research was divided into two distinct parts: deskbased research and fieldwork. Desk-based research included both archival and bibliographical work in local archives and various libraries at the University of Athens and online. Bibliographic and archival research provided an adequate background on the biography of Anatoli village and the wider area of Hierapetra. Subsequently, fieldwork not only focused on gaining a holistic view of the area but also on collecting and examining the views of the local community in the limited time of the on-site investigation. Therefore, a range of qualitative methodological tools was put into place, such as interviews (Davies 1999: 95; Mason 2002: 63; Yow 2005: 8), life stories (Davies 1999: 167; Marcus 1998: 94) and participant observation (Davies 1999: 67). The semi-structured interviews constituted the main methodological tool. In particular, the face-to-face interviews followed a detailed interview guide, November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 41 but at the same time, they remained open to follow concepts brought up by the discussants. In order to increase the level of participation and provide comfort for the informants, all the interviews were held in their activity areas and lasted as long as they desired, while all the participants provided their informed consent. Approximately sixty informants participated in a total of thirty-five individual and group interviews (fig. 4), that were conducted over a period of six months of fieldwork, spread over three years (from July 2017 to August 2020). Figure 4. Still frame from an individual interview in Anatoli village (reproduced with permission of Sotiris Tsiganos). During the same period, intensive participant observation was accomplished through involvement in various activities led by the informants and through the organisation of public archaeology activities and events in the village (fig. 5). Among them were community gatherings, archaeological tours and lectures, workshops on ancient diet and pottery manufacturing, seminars on beekeeping, herbs and cultivation offered by the locals, communal dinners, the creation of an experimental ethnographic video about the village and the implementation of a three-day public archaeology festival in the wider area. This process of open, long-term and patient observation and entanglement allowed the development of greater insight and understanding of the social 42 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 5. Still frame from a community event in Anatoli village (reproduced with permission of Sotiris Tsiganos). position and perspective of residents, while it facilitated the affirmation of concepts recorded in oral interviews (Davies 1999: 94-116). Through the systematic study of their content, its documentation and juxtaposition with other written sources, along with the immersion into Anatoli’s society, arose some central conclusions that reveal the grand scheme of things regarding the local society’s association with its place and past, and by extension with archaeology and its finds. The social role of the archaeological project in Anatoli village A key point in the conclusions of the ethnographic research in Anatoli village is that the local community’s attitude toward archaeology is filtered through its relation to place. This was not surprising, since, as seen in the anthropological research of many rural communities, the landscape is attached to every aspect of the inhabitants’ life, embodies their values and serves as pegs on which people hang memories, construct meanings and establish arenas of action (Hirsch and Stewart 2005; Stewart and Strathern 2003: 1-3; Shankland 1999: 139). What was surprising, though, was that the relationship of the inhabitants of Anatoli with their village can be described as bipolar, since the landscape simultaneously acts as a depositary of the community’s identity November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 43 and as a reminder of the bygone hardships. An older informant confessed: “Only God knows what I went through… we suffered in the past…”. To that end, place seems to intervene in the inhabitants’ perception of the past. Their oral testimonies unveiled a spatial conception of time (Basso 1996: 34), where the recent past of Anatoli is divided into two time periods, the one before the abandonment of both the mountain areas and the village settlement in the 1970s and the one that followed right after it, which resulted in the abolishment of the community (Gianniri 2022: 117-134). The lack of continuity in the life histories and the structure of Anatoli’s past in terms of a ‘before’ and an ‘after’ imply the existence of trauma within its society (Rogers et al. 2000: 15), that is yet to be resolved. This traumatic relationship was often evident in the words of the informants: “Well… they [those who left] don’t want to return to the village. A woman from Anatoli once told me: I am not returning there, not even dead.” The displacement of the population affected the formation of the social identity of both the remaining residents and those who left. The first felt they were left behind, whereas the latter, who suddenly became rich, turned away from the village which was becoming reminiscent of their deprived past. Anatoli formed a contested space, where economic gains, memory and identity were involved in a silent struggle, pushing the community toward a space-time break with its past (Gianniri 2022: 182-183). These opposing feelings had not been recalled until archaeology triggered the reintroduction of the past in the present. Apparently, the double abandonment of the mountain areas and the village settlement and the trauma resulting from it affected the community’s stance toward the archaeological project in multiple ways. The fact that the mountain areas, where the archaeological sites are located, are not in use prevented the emergence of competing concerns and conflict between the locals and the archaeologists. A local farmer stated: “Fortunately where it is [the archaeological finds] it doesn't affect anything, no property or anything, it just adds value to the area”. On the contrary, the interest of the archaeologists in the area, their devotion to the project and their choice to reside in the small and remote mountain village won the locals over. Besides, the discovery of Minoan antiquities in the wider 44 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 area of the village stirred up feelings of pride about their place (Gianniri 2022: 184). An informant, who could be described as an ‘external observer’ (van Boeschoten 2015), as he is from the village and has an intimate knowledge of it, but he is not living there permanently, explained the positive stance of the residents of Anatoli: “… you know the excavation enjoyed a high level of acceptance… you became beloved to the village and I will tell you why… the villager felt a sense of pride when he saw your team struggling to bring to the surface the history of the place. Meanwhile, you invited them, they came to the excavation site”. Hence, there was no confrontation neither over the use of the heritage site nor over the conceptualisations and the meanings attributed to it. The reasons for this are twofold. In the first place, the nature of the findings was not as grand as the residents expected at the beginning of the investigation. During a group interview, they actually confessed: “There was nothing to make a splash!”. While the Minoan building and the peak sanctuary on the mountains of Anatoli are of great scientific importance, they are certainly not comparable to the Minoan palaces of Knossos, Faistos, Mallia and Zakros. Consequently, they cannot form the basis for a local touristic development and the opening of the site to the public seems to be a risky business that will not include great economic stakes for the community. But even if it had, the ethnographic research showed that the locals are not interested in attracting tourism to the village because most of them make a sufficient living from greenhouse cultivation. Secondly, it was expressed during the interviews that the local community is not willing to use the archaeological evidence, in order to construct or reproduce a ‘Minoan identity’. As opposed to other areas in Crete (Solomon 2003; see also Hamilakis 2006; Lenakake 2000), the people of Anatoli do not identify themselves as descendants of the Minoans3, and 3 This is particularly interesting, considering the ways the archaeological record that we call ‘Minoan’ and its deployment and consumption in various contexts, intersects with the lives of people in Crete (Hamilakis 2006; see also Hamilakis and Yalouri 1996; Solomon 2003; Herzfeld 2003). Other case studies in which the local community does not draw its identity from descent from the Minoans are these of the villages around the site of Gortys (Hamilakis 2006) November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 45 Figure 6. The wider area of Anatoli on the map of Crete (photograph by Google Earth). they do not seem to perceive the archaeological excavations and their finds as a means to achieve reputation, prestige, notability or symbolic capital on a local, regional or inter-regional scale (Gianniri 2022: 185). This observation was also expressed by an informant, who said that the value of the find is not realised by his fellow villagers: “Well, don't think now… don’t expect that the locals understand what it is going on up there [Gaidourofas site]. If it is good or if it’s not, but… You see, my child, in other areas they’re on it, people care”. On this basis, the economic and social effects of the archaeologists’ presence within the village setting were confined to the money that was provided to the workmen4 and the mere presence of the researchers as outsiders. Nevertheless, and of the village Gonies in central Crete (Anagnostopoulos et al. 2000). 4 It is worth noting that in some cases archaeologists’ efforts to hire wage labourers in order to combat inequality, might lead simultaneously to its sustenance since the economic benefits of archaeological research are distributed unequally (Kurnick 2020; see also Shankland 1999: 46 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 the expansion of the archaeological project to other areas (fig. 6) during recent years and the organisation of a series of large-scale events, including a public archaeology festival, shifted the power dynamics, both in Anatoli and in the wider area. The trace of politics This came as no surprise since archaeology is always already a political project (Castañeda and Matthews 2008: 8; see also Leone 2008). Politics is inseparable in the life of the discipline since archaeological practice is socially embedded and politically contingent (Perring and Van der Linde 2009; Tully 2007), and therefore it has real consequences for the groups related to the archaeological sites in various ways. Accordingly, their interests and agendas often collide with those of the scientific team (Catapoti 2013; Hamilakis 2010; Sutton and Stroulia 2010), resulting in conflict situations, that involve economic and social stakes. Thus, while the local community of Anatoli perceived the prolongation of the archaeological project and its expansion to other areas as a positive sign for the village’s future and felt honoured that it became the centre of attention, not everyone shared the same enthusiasm. The new cultural association of the village, whose members do not live permanently in Anatoli, felt threatened by the multiple events and public archaeology activities implemented by the archaeological team, as they could have overshadowed its action. At the same time, the team’s seasonal accommodation at the village was compromised, due to the antagonism between the members of the new and the old cultural association, who had offered the association’s premises to the archaeological project in order to work and reside for free. Thus, while the local community of Anatoli perceived the prolongation of the archaeological project and its expansion to other areas as a positive sign for 138). November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 47 the village’s future and felt honoured that it became the centre of attention, not everyone shared the same enthusiasm. The new cultural association of the village, whose members do not live permanently in Anatoli, felt threatened by the multiple events and public archaeology activities implemented by the archaeological team, as they could have overshadowed its action. At the same time, the team’s seasonal accommodation at the village was compromised, due to the antagonism between the members of the new and the old cultural association, who had offered the association’s premises to the archaeological project in order to work and reside for free. An evident conflict of interests occurred simultaneously between the archaeological team and other stakeholder groups, as the archaeological research was moving from the mountain to low-lying coastal areas. The conduct of surface surveys in the greenhouses’ areas and the discovery of an intact late Minoan tomb in an olive grove, near the village Kentri in Hierapetra provoked the cultivators, who were afraid of losing their properties. Likewise, the majority of the residents of Kentri village took a stand against the archaeologists and their fellow villagers who helped them, since they did not want anything to do with archaeology. Later on, when the value of the archaeological finds was revealed their attitude toward archaeology changed and they even claimed their right to a financial reward for the find. To bridge the gap between the diverse stakeholder groups, namely the permanent residents of Anatoli village, those who come from Anatoli but have left the village, the Hierapetra plain greenhouses’ cultivators, the residents of Kentri village and the Hierapetra city’s inhabitants, and bring them together so they could get to know the archaeological team and its work, a three-day public archaeology festival, the ‘ArchaeoLogic Festival’, 5 was organised in the wider area. This goal was fulfilled through the implementation of the festival, which constituted an arena for the production, negotiation and transformation of meanings, memories, identities and values (Crang and 5 The documentation of the ArchaeoLogic Festival can be found on the following link: https://vimeo.com/340295123. 48 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Tolia-Kelly 2010; see also Jones 2017) and seemed to be a fruitful experience both for the participants and the archaeological team. Particularly meaningful was the fact that the locals not only actively participated in the activities of the festival, but also coordinated their own, such as a narrative tour through an outdoor photo exhibition in Αnatoli’s narrow streets (Gianniri 2023). However, traces of politics were pinpointed once again. On the very first day of the festival, representatives of the different local political parties showed up to shake hands and be photographed with the director of the archaeological project, as a way of promoting a positive image given the upcoming elections. It is worth mentioning that the mayor at the time, who had supported ArchaeoLogic Festival since day one, did not make any attempt to manipulate either the archaeological team or the activities of the festival to promote his reelection. Thoughts and questions on our role in a local community context In light of the above, it can be clearly seen that the choice of an archaeological ethnography approach and/or the initiative to run a bottomup public archaeology project is a two-way political act itself. By driving the communities to engage with archaeology and heritage, they become social agents of their own history and archaeology in the present, they construct a more inclusive version of their past and by extension, they are empowered to feel differently about themselves (Matthews 2008: 179). While these processes are in progress, the researcher can reconstruct the complex network of community relationships, learn about the interests and the conflicts that formed the sociopolitical landscape and elaborate further on his understanding of both distant and recent past. At the same time though, ethnographic work itself has the potential to enact power relations, that are often ambivalent and potentially counter-hegemonic (Kurnick 2020; Clifford 1992: 6-9), especially when the local voices emerge in the passive form of the ‘ethnographised’ (Edgeworth 2006: 15), and not in direct dialogue with the professionals, to examine the sociopolitical relationships between them and negotiate the power and control through reflexive and participatory practices. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 49 Undoubtedly, working with communities is a sensitive issue, since the existence of groups with different agendas poses a great challenge for archaeological practice and raises questions about the role of an archaeological project within local communities and its imprint on a constantly changing world. Thus, what we should be asking ourselves as scholars, social beings and political animals by nature is how do or should we pursue our work given this diversity of interests related to the sites (Bartu 2000: 102)? Should a scientific project take a stand and how? Should we strategically deal with emerging interests to serve our own ends? Should local views be minimised in favour of archaeology? Should archaeological work be determined by the contemporary political and socioeconomic conditions of the community? Is the impact of public archaeology activities strong enough to break even the power imbalances? Do we have the skills to impact a diverse community for the better? Do we have the right to try to do so? Do we unwittingly resonate with colonial rhetoric by drawing attention to a community’s activities (González-Ruibal 2009: 114; see also Kurnick 2020)? How may a reflexive public archaeology be designed so that it can express the concerns of the margins (Matthews 2008: 163; Hodder 2003) and their present-day needs? Conclusion There may be no clear answers to these questions yet, but the fact that such questions are forming and keep coming back over the last few decades underlines that the discipline is in a good position to understand its sociopolitical dimension, to face its responsibilities as a producer and interpreter of knowledge (Zimmerman 2006; see also Smith and Wobst 2005) and to consider the work of the archaeologist as more than scientific or academic. We cannot pretend to be neutral these days, while politics and archaeology go beyond grand narratives of nationhood, and extend into everyday matters, such as relatively small but vital functions of the local communities, which we work with (Lennox and Richardson 2016; Perring and Van der Linde 2009). Thus, to address the political dimension of archaeology is not only to confront the political means through which it has been constituted but also to oppose power asymmetries and inequality inside and outside the discipline (Hamilakis 2008: 11), even on a small scale. 50 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Archaeological ethnography can effectively contribute to it. The ethnographic research in Anatoli village showed that one such practice leads to personal relationships that enable archaeological expertise to be of use to the local community and enables the researchers to navigate the complexities of onsite power networks (Kyriakidis and Anagnostopoulos 2015; Hodder 2003). What is more, archaeological ethnography prioritises the living communities over the deceased and moves their present to the foreground, where it remains their own and not archaeology’s (Zimmerman 2008: 202). This way, it serves as a catalyst in ideological struggles that have real consequences for people, recognises and benefits social groups, reinforces a sense of community and contributes altogether to the construction of an honest and emancipatory scholarship with an archaeology that is politically self-conscious (McGuire 2008: 21, 36-37) and concerned not only with the ways people engage with material past but also with the ways they engage with the present (Jones 2017; Smith and Akagawa 2009:2; Stroulia and Sutton 2009). It has been almost 30 years since Homi Bhabha (1994: 42) encouraged the breakdown of Western thought’s ‘linear narrative of the nation’, with its claims of a ‘fixed horizontal nation-space’ with ‘holism of culture and community’ (Leone and Knauf 2015: 7), yet his call seems to be more relevant now than ever. At a time when a neoliberal agenda of economic utilitarianism, along with empirical-quantitative models of science, threatens to dominate academic research (Zapf 2016:1), it is essential to realise that it is only through the involvement with local communities and small scale case studies that the non-linearity of the world and its phenomena can be grasped and new cosmopolitics can be conceptualised. Particularly, approaches such as archaeological ethnography have the unique ability to trigger out-of-thebox thinking, uncertain exploration and unlimited circulation of ideas, to establish new multiscalar vistas of reality, to insert reflexivity into academia, to evoke empathy and care and to deconstruct the anti-emotional culture and the prioritisation of intellect over other aspects of human experience. After all, if we assume that archaeology offers the possibility for people ‘to see a world in a grain of sand’ (Blake 1971: 585), then archaeological ethnography could unlock multiple worlds for them to see and encounter. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 51 Acknowledgements I am always grateful to my supervisor Professor Marlen Mouliou for her constant support and selfless guidance since the beginning of my postgraduate studies and for introducing me to the world of Public Archaeology; I am also grateful to Professor Yiannis Papadatos for always supporting my choices, even when he disagrees; My warm thanks go also to Professor Dimitris Plantzos for being an endless source of inspiration. 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November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 57 Towards a New Project Design Methodology for Archaeological Projects in England Sadie Watson Museum of London Archaeology [email protected] Abstract The policy framework within which development-led archaeology is conducted in the UK is well understood and the contracting sector is an accepted stage in the planning process due to various policies, originating from both national and local Government. Projects are undertaken following standards established by Historic England almost two decades ago, with management systems and stages commonly followed. Yet our project design methodology hasn’t evolved to reflect the changing times, or encouraged capacity for considering the publics, with intended beneficiaries of our work poorly identified and often misunderstood. This paper proposes a new process of project management for development-led archaeology, to ensure that we conduct work that has meaningful and sustainable outcomes for the wider publics. I outline the challenges within the current structure and provide a revised project life cycle with publics at its heart. Introduction The national and local Government policy landscape within which development-led archaeology is conducted in the UK is well established and the contracting sector is an accepted stage within the wider planning process (the clearest explanation of the system is provided by the statutory body Historic England [2022a]). The UK-based commercially contracted sector undertake projects through standards established decades ago, with management systems and project stages commonly understood by both individual practitioners and a range of representative professional bodies alike (Chartered Institute for Archaeologists [CIfA] 2023a; Federation of Archaeological Managers and Employers [FAME] 2023; English Heritage 1991; Historic England 2015a; 58 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 2015b). A recent review reported that the commercial archaeological sector contributes £218m annually to the national UK economy, providing employment to over 6300 people (Aitchison, German and Rocks Macqueen 2021). There is a widespread belief that development-led archaeology operates at a high technical level (British Academy 2017: 27-29; Thomas 2021), and those contracting organisations that are part of the sectoral professional body’s (CIfA) scheme comply with agreed standards of work. This is the primary form of archaeological work that occurs in Britain, vastly outstripping academic or community projects. This separation however is unhelpful, as it perpetuates the understanding that development-led work is somehow neither of an academic standard, nor community-facing. These are ongoing challenges that the sector has tackled on more than one occasion (e.g. Wills 2018; Society of Antiquaries of London [SAL] 2020). The largely privatised contracting system means that many different actants are responsible for archaeological projects with a cynicism that projects are undertaken on behalf of clients, rather than the public at large (Fredheim and Watson 2023: 20-21). This is in opposition to the industry’s accepted professional standards, which require us to commit to specific competencies and ethical behaviours (CIfA 2023b) with a focus on public service, and is despite the fact that archaeology is a highly socially contingent endeavour, even more so in the development-led sphere with Carver calling this type of work a form of ‘social contract’ (2009: 358); conducted on behalf of the wider public. This paper is the culmination of a 4-year Future Leader Fellowship, which has involved extensive consultation with communities, the client body and policy makers (MOLA 2019). Results have shown that there is much appetite for a more human-centred consideration of archaeology within the planning process, the next step is to review existing project design mechanisms to enable that change. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 59 Legislative background and guiding principles The basic legislative landscape within which archaeology is enabled (and required) through the planning system within the UK has not changed significantly since 1991. Notably the legal protection for archaeology is extended to undesignated assets, including those as yet unknown (for a full exposition see Historic England 2022a: 3-8). Both national and local governments provide critical support to this system. Whilst providing a structure for decision-making (and crucially, funding) the planning frameworks are often restrictive in the expectations they can place on developers. Professional, county/district council-based curatorial staff utilise guidance on deciding significance, with a complex and inter-linked series of values to be considered (Historic England 2008; 2022a: 36-37). The guiding principle remains that the development-led process provides outstanding and uniquely sourced knowledge of the historic environment (Ibid: 9). There are also significant opportunities for public benefit, defined as environmental, economic and social (Ibid: 10) all of which are specified in the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) (MHCLG 2019). However, the provision of these opportunities is patchy, and often depends on individual input and specific funding arrangements. As such, the introduction of the NPPF has not seen wholescale improvements in public benefit, reasons for which have been discussed by (e.g.) Thomas (2019). The challenge of embedding public benefit into all stages of work is no small one, but incremental steps are currently being undertaken by the sector-wide 21st Century Challenges in Archaeology project (Wills 2018) which acknowledges that all areas of work (policy, curatorial services, standards and guidance, commercial practice, project design, dissemination, archiving) need to be drawn into this endeavour. Despite the fact that the four nations of the United Kingdom have differing mechanisms within which archaeology takes place they aim to provide parallel routes to public benefit. Recent developments in the Scottish provision have placed public benefit considerations at the fore of development-led work (Mann 2023) and in Wales the Wellbeing for Future Generations Act should 60 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 encourage similar refocusing of commercially driven archaeology towards public benefit and social value (Belford 2019: 195). In Northern Ireland there is a more challenging backdrop due to the recent history of sectarian conflict and contested heritage landscapes but the Archaeology Strategy 2030 (O’Keeffe 2021) is clear on the need to embed public benefit throughout the sector. There is a gradual movement towards the aspirations of the Faro Convention (Council of Europe 2005), which states the right of everyone to benefit from their cultural heritage. However, we have not yet seen a major impact on contracting practice (Watson and Fredheim 2022), despite some meaningful local case studies (e.g. Considerate Constructors Scheme [CCS] 2023; CIfA 2023c). Internationally, the European Archaeological Council ([EAC] 2018: 18) suggests that the social impact of a development is rarely considered by archaeologists during their project design process, which can separate their work from more deliberate attempts to increase its wider value. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) have highlighted that the gap between policy makers and communities should be narrowed through increasing the scale of co-designed projects (2022). This might be a challenge due to the ‘normative’ behaviours still threaded through practice (Perry 2019: 358) that are consistently failing to engage wider publics rather than encouraging them to engage, due to the focus on conservation, preservation and the endangerment narratives so ably critiqued by May (2020), Fredheim (2020) and Högberg et al (2017) as perpetuating ideas of traditional engagement and a continuation of current management practices, thereby stifling new opportunities for participation. Project design and management in archaeology Developed in the 1990s, the project design and management system used throughout UK development-led archaeology (Management of Archaeological Projects, known as MAP2) followed structures utilised widely in commerce and industry (Andrews and Thomas 1995: 204-5), with a clear influence from science and engineering where objectively measurable milestones are seen as most useful (Brooke 1995: 130). This task-driven approach has a November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 61 focus on review stages and the introduction of a post-excavation assessment (PXA) stage was intended to ensure that projects no longer ran out of funding prior to analysis and dissemination, which had previously been a major problem (Andrews and Thomas: 196-199). Nonetheless this issue perpetuates, despite this attempt to rationalise the process. Heaton (2014: n12) notes that MAP2 was designed for backlog and state-funded projects, rather than live commercial projects, and while the relevance of this today is open for debate, contracting archaeology undeniably occurs within a highly competitive commercial environment, the current extent of which was (understandably) not previously foreseen. The MAP2 Preface (English Heritage 1991) suggested it should be revised in the future but this has not yet happened to any significant degree. Today, after the passing of more than 30 years a successful outcome for an archaeological project has evolved from ‘published report...supported by an...archive’ (Ibid: 5) to something more akin to the provision of public benefit, although that remains poorly defined, rarely stringently evaluated, and open to individual perspectives (Fredheim and Watson 2023: 22-23). There is not room here to discuss the contents of MAP2 in detail, but although many aspects of projects have moved on significantly for legal, commercial or client-driven reasons the process remains closely aligned with the construction sector’s need for a series of incremental work packages that can be closed off in successive steps (Darvill 2006: 231). It is interesting to see which areas of MAP2 have been adopted wholesale as standard practice, and which fell by the wayside, specifically in the case of this paper the presumption of community involvement (English Heritage 1991: 28). That this isn’t generally undertaken is almost certainly due to the sub-contracted nature of archaeology, which has positioned our work as an expert technical service, usually provided during groundworks in advance of development, rather than a value-added opportunity (Fredheim and Watson 2023: 20-23). The perception that increased public benefit will inevitably involve access to dangerous construction sites and would require extensive funding persists, holding the sector back from considering alternatives (Sloane 2018). This is 62 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 probably due to pervasive ideas of fieldwork as the most interesting aspect of a project, despite growing evidence that there is appetite for other forms of participation, including intellectual input into project designs, research aims and dissemination plans (Faccia in prep.). The persistent gap between the legal requirements placed on developers and their archaeological contractors to merely mitigate the damage to archaeological assets, and the suggested best practice around dissemination and public engagement means that innovative provision of the latter cannot yet be a necessity of commercial funding or planning permission. In England MAP 2 was largely superseded for technical guidance by the Management of Research Projects in the Historic Environment (MoRPHE) (Historic England 2015a) and Project Planning Note 3 (Historic England 2015b), intended to provide guidance for projects of varying funding and contractual origin. The presumption is still that projects will result in a knowledge gain, dependent upon the dissemination of results (Ibid: 4). In an acknowledgement that the benefits provided through this system can be expanded beyond knowledge creation, Historic England themselves have a rapidly developing understanding of how impactful heritage and archaeological work can be for wider communities, including provision of positive wellbeing improvements (2022b; Monckton and Watson 2022), so there is space for an evolution of policy to enable that. Considering new ways of sharing the knowledge gain are a necessary reminder that archaeology can be presented in myriad ways depending on how the knowledge benefit is to be provided, as Sloane suggests in relation to very specific aspects such as scientific advances concerning the historic spread of disease (2021). The current ways in which these various guidance notes and professional standards are implemented are examples of classical and specialist management systems, whereby specialists are organised through a line management hierarchy as well as through a project-specific structure (Nixon 1995: 221). Commonly understood concepts such as quality control and ‘by rote’ tasks have their origin in manufacturing (Cooper 1995: 75), with a focus on process and product rather than on people. These systems can neglect the impact on humans as a result, and key needs such as agency and motivation are sidelined November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 63 in favour of a task-driven emphasis. This approach was deemed appropriate at the onset of contracting practice, when the sector was keen to integrate into client structures to illustrate its relevance to construction operations. A task-driven mentality might be applicable to some stages of fieldwork, where tight adherence to programmes and budgets is key, although perhaps it is less helpful when thinking about post-excavation and public-facing work which can be inherently less process-driven, externally managed, and linear (McAdam 1995: 98). The persistence of this project design structure reduces the way that we might illustrate archaeology as a social practice, given that it enforces the idea that archaeology is a highly procedural problem-solving operation (Cumberpatch and Roberts 2012: 33). Despite this situation, archaeology as a public-facing undertaking has increasingly grown within many of the organisations that make up the contracting sector, with recent data showing 250 archaeologists with job titles broadly identifying them as ‘public archaeologist’ (Aitchison et al 2021: Table 2.19.1). There are successful organisations set up with public-facing delivery at the heart of their model (e.g. DigVentures, Past Participate and Big Heritage, although these organisations do not generally provide services to the construction industry and operate under different funding models). The exclusion of project beneficiaries (which could mean academics, wider publics or specific groups thereof) from the project teams in both MAP2 (Historic England 1991: 25) and MoRPHE (Historic England 2015a: Figs 3a and 3b) is a symptom of their period of production and doesn’t reflect a deliberate attempt to exclude. In 2023 we can now recognise the need to identify beneficiaries to enable research, design, and results to be targeted usefully; in other words, to deliberately include. Other models in theory and practice As part of construction procurement chains archaeological organisations are increasingly asked to include their public benefit provision in tender documentation (where social value is the commonly used term). This is already formalised in the 2013 Public Services (Social Value) Act (UK Govt 2021) which outlines requirements for publicly funded projects to be assessed in 64 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 terms of their social value as well as their financial implications. Social value in this context is broadly defined as the financial and nonfinancial value that contributes to the wellbeing of both individuals and communities, in addition to positive impacts on the environment. It is not created through the standard operations of an organisation, but should be beyond ‘business as usual’. Accordingly, for archaeologists; excavation, archiving and dissemination of results would not count as social value as defined by the Act. Projects requiring value creation beyond the standard offer would include transport infrastructure, which has formed the largest proportion of commercial archaeological income in recent years (Aitchison et al 2021: Table 1.5.3.). In the Public Procurement Bill (UK Govt 2022) the UK Government advocates moving from a Most Economically Advantageous Tender (MEAT) to a Most Advantageous Tender (MAT), recognising and requiring that adding value to a project means more than simply monetary value. The construction sector is facing increasing pressure to behave more responsibly, and companies now specify their intentions to provide value beyond their standard offer. Parallel to this, the consulting sector has grown exponentially and now forms a crucial part of the wider archaeological ecosystem. Collcutt (2006: 220) frames this as a reason for concern, in that adding more managerial levels shows a ‘decreased willingness to allow downward delegation of decision-making' but many of the larger firms offering heritage consultancy services also have in-house social value teams, who need to be invited to sit at the same table during the early stages of a given project, in order to design and embed ideas around how archaeology can contribute to their wider aims for impacted communities. There are clear opportunities here. Allied professionals have created toolkits to lead their sectors through decision-making over public benefit (social value) provision (e.g. UK Green Building Council [UKGBC] 2022; Royal Institute of British Architects [RIBA] 2020). The key point for us here is that these are guides to project management processes, which (amongst other things) specify a model delivery plan (UKGBC 2022: 33) and provide sample questions to be asked of communities (RIBA 2020: 14-15). In a profession such as archaeology, where a flowchart often leads us through our widely recognised and commonly followed processes, this is both immediately familiar and theoretically broadly applicable. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 65 Figure 1. Logic model illustrating rationale behind proposed changes to project design methodology, showing how expanded resources at early stage might lead to enhanced outcomes from development-led projects. Towards a new model The preceding discussion has led us to the point where we need to propose how these issues might be tackled, at least within a framework that archaeologists will recognise and pivot towards with understanding. The logic model (Figure 1) illustrates how a typical project could contribute to value for wider society through expanding the resources used, and by targeting outcomes as well as outputs to the needs identified during the early stages of a project. The three horizontal aspects of the model indicate the three principal stakeholder groups this is intended to benefit: the sector (to include curatorial archaeologists), the communities, and the client body. Others could be incorporated but it is useful to consider who the main beneficiaries of an amended model could be. Several of the larger organisations working in archaeology are educational charities, with enhanced expectations of their public benefit provision, although this has been questioned with reference to vague reporting and lack of specific identification of beneficiaries (Fredheim and Watson 2023: 30-31). Including beneficiaries in project design teams 66 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 would provide evidence of these aims, and evaluation of the public benefit provision would be a meaningful way to realistically interrogate them. This degree of revision requires a change in project management methodology, to lead us through the decision-making processes, to introduce those various new datasets we should be including in our assessments identified in Figure 1, and to enable us to produce plans that are achievable, scalable, and regularly evaluated. The revised and simplified life cycle of a typical project (Figure 2) has been adapted from models provided in current guidance (Historic England 1991; 2015; 2022a) and shows in more detail how these decisions could be made at each typical step. Critical here are the new milestones, and the new ways of thinking about impact. The order of actions remains broadly the same, with allowance for the value creation at certain intervals as indicated. There is less focus in this version in the costing and tendering process, as that is an accepted (and expected) part of this process, as are the professional requirements for reporting and archiving. For reasons of space, the fieldwork referred to here is evaluation followed by excavation, but there are other forms this work could take depending on results and scale of the works. If a desk-based assessment reveals only the need for a ‘watching brief’ whereby groundworks are monitored by an archaeologist then perhaps there will be less opportunity for public benefit, although it could be argued that a small amount of archaeology on a local site means much more to the surrounding community than a lot of archaeology many miles away. The scalability of these proposals needs experimentation, as an enlightened client may see the potential in results from a watching brief, thereby providing an expanded interpretation of significance beyond merely its archaeological aspects. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 67 Figure 2. Revised life cycle of typical development-led archaeology project (adapted from Historic England 1991; Fredheim and Watson 2023: 24-25). The tasks are shown vertically, the revised milestones relate to Review Points (as in Historic England 2015b: 9) and are shown in the bubbles where they may be appropriate. 68 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Put simply, in the absence of a suitable regulatory framework to require such a process, these proposals are intended to encourage decision making to be more value-led, putting people at the heart of a project rather than profit or client, or even, perhaps, on occasion, the archaeology. Archaeologists are used to paring down or adapting fieldwork plans in response to traditional concerns such as evolving research aims and unexpected results, but these proposals are calling for other criteria to be considered alongside these, perhaps in response to research aims determined by the local community, the potential for reuse of discarded archaeological materials or an obligation to consider the wellbeing of participants above the physical condition of aspects of the archaeology (see Archaeology on Prescription [York Archaeology 2022] for an example of when this might occur). Critiques may come from the inclusion of client aims in these methodologies, but contracting archaeologists operate within a highly competitive commercial environment and these considerations are crucial to ensure that work is undertaken by organisations who understand the need to respond to both their clients and their communities. This will not solve the fundamental challenges posed to us by the ill-fitting imposition of neo-liberal economic models that have required a previously academic, participatory pursuit such as archaeology to become a cost-driven exercise at the expense of research-led practice, but it will offset some of the major issues many of us are increasingly aware of (see Watson 2021). To further illustrate the need to include other actants in this process, Figure 3 shows an adapted version of the possible MoRPHE project roles (from Historic England 2015b: 13). This model is primarily intended for larger projects with wider responsibilities but also indicates how these principles could also be relevant for much smaller projects. The assumption that MAP2 decisions will be based on research potential (Andrews and Thomas 1995: 204) will be thrown into relief by bringing wider voices into the discussion. The consultees are shown at a remove from the main project roles as previously but there will be more linkage and increased two-way communication in this system. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 69 Figure 3: Revised model showing typical MoRPHE project roles (adapted from Historic England 2015b). Making it happen Progress away from accepted systems and structures is naturally slow, and the development-led sector operates within the tricky dichotomy of providing technical specialist services to the construction industry while also aiming to provide innovative and meaningful public benefit. This results in narrow funding regimes and programmes that restrict opportunities for wider participation. Expecting sector buy-in without the additional levers of policy is perhaps naïve, as our system operates within a rigid structure of policy, funding, and embedded notions of expertise. However, whether or not we theorise to this degree during contracting projects, both a multiplicity of opinions and a recognition of uncertainty are acknowledged as necessary for archaeology to be undertaken responsibly (D’Alisa and Kallis 2015: 220). 70 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 We need to expand these concepts beyond our own professional and commercial circles, whilst actively bringing the members of those new circles along with us. Here we might usefully turn to the considerations raised by D’Alisa and Kallis (2015) that a separation between experts, policy makers and the public is problematic, and that all three elements should rather be integrated within the design and development of research and policymaking. This could move us ‘from an expert community to a community of experts’, wherein we draw on experience and expertise from a wider societal group to ensure and assure that the work we undertake is proportionate and useful (Ibid: 219). This supports the UNESCO view that policy-driven decisions can in fact run counter to concerns of communities if the ‘plurality of narratives’ is not considered (UNESCO 2022: 2). Tarlow and Pluciennik (2007: 125) further remind us that ethical practice need not only be reliant upon adherence to business ethics but should also include considerations of impact on publics. This tension is already recognised within the arena of cultural heritage capital, which seeks to understand where the value lies in heritage for people, and how to measure that value in order to maximise its potential for individual and communal wellbeing (Dorpalen nd; Leeson nd; Watson 2023). The professional interpretation of concepts such as value, rarity, complexity and significance will rarely match the ways in which wider society will interpret these (Darvill 2006: 415), which blurs the line in ways that we should find worth exploring. When innovation does happen in development-led archaeology it generally falls into areas of technological change and comprises a celebration of ‘newness’ (Frieman 2021) which seems to require a forward and linear movement, a direction away from ideas, methods or tools that are now seen as out of date or obsolete. Frieman (Ibid: 16-18) warns us that social innovation is far more complex and we can use this framing to reconsider how the innovation proposed in this paper might instead focus on people, and therefore may not be an efficiency-driven progression, but a reconsideration of method and practice; leading us to a more human-centred approach. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 71 The onus on communication between humans might seem old fashioned in the context of innovation and change but this might be what many Western structures need. Existing professional frameworks are recognised as exclusionary to colleagues (Brunache et al 2021), let alone the wider public, and amending this requires a reconsideration of professionalism and expertise, and how these interact with notions of value and significance. A review need not be a rejection of previous pathways but should encourage an honest reflection of how the embedded methods have come to be so well-worn. The models provided here are intended to catalyse conversations over how we might enable a wider set of voices to engage with project design, how project management might become more inclusive, and how revising project implementation could widen participation in development-led archaeology on a sustainable basis. Acknowledgements I would like to thank the editors for accepting this paper and for their assistance throughout the editing process. Particular thanks are due to the two peer reviewers who sent in detailed and helpful feedback. The research leading up to this was funded by UKRI (Future Leader Fellowship) and supported by MOLA. Thanks to MOLA illustrators Juan Jose Fuldain Gonzalez and Jemina Dunnett for producing the figures. My thoughts on this topic have been shaped by conversations with many colleagues over the last four years, in particular I want to acknowledge Kate Faccia, Guillermo Diaz de Liaño del Valle, Harald Fredheim, Sara Perry, Emma Dwyer and Barney Sloane. The opinions behind my research focus have been shaped by decades in the sector, alongside respected and treasured colleagues too numerous to name. 72 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 References Aitchison, K., German, P., and Rocks-Macqueen, D. 2021. Profiling the Profession, Landward Research Ltd, Profiling the Profession 2020: Introduction – Profiling the Profession accessed on 5th March 2023. Andrews, G., and Thomas, R. 1995. 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YA (York Archaeology) 2022, Archaeology on Prescription, https://community.yorkarchaeology.co.uk/index.php/archaeology-on-prescription/ accessed on 13th September 2023. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 77 Archaeology, Indigenous and Local Knowledge, and Climate Change in the Caribbean: Select Case Studies among the Kalinago, Macushi and Maroon communities in the Windward Islands and the Guianas. Andrea Richards Leiden University Cheryl White Anton de Kom University Louisa Daggers University of Guyana Thanya SokÉ-Fonkel Anton de Kom University / Saamaka Maroon Community of Guyana Annalisa Edwards Macushi Amerindian Community in Guyana Augustine 'Sardo' Sutherland Kalinago Tribe in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Irvince Auguiste Kalinago Community in the Commonwealth of Dominica [email protected] Abstract Within the geographic space known as the Caribbean, vulnerability to and because of climate-induced hazards is commonplace. Contributing to this are the various geophysical features and historical land use issues which define the region, some of which have contributed to how traditional communities are both impacted by and respond to the changing climate. These hazards are experienced through rising sea levels, coastal inundation and storm surges, and increasingly severe and erratic weather events, impacting, for example, wet and dry 78 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 seasons, water and food security, and infrastructure. Although the region's vulnerability has increased, climatic challenges are not a 21st century phenomena. Its first inhabitants several millennia ago experienced climate-induced and other natural hazards, requiring ongoing adaptation to constantly changing environments. Our traditional communities have had long relationships with their natural environment and so play a critical role in studying this humanenvironment dynamic through a long-term perspective. Not only are they exposed to these hazards contributing to vulnerability at the community level, but their heritage is also exposed. Through their traditional knowledge and archaeological data from their ancient villages, knowledge is passed down today as a guide for climate action and providing essential indicators for past and future resilience. This paper examines how the changing climate intersects with archaeology, Indigenous and local knowledge in relation to ongoing and future climate action and narratives in the Caribbean. This is approached through a focus on case studies among the Kalinago of Dominica and Saint Vincent, the Macushi from Guyana, and Maroon communities from Suriname, highlighting how traditional knowledge and archaeological research can provide valuable data concerning past climate adaptation and a better understanding of Indigenous and local responses. This paper emanates from a knowledge-exchange event held in Aruba in November 2022, which brought together communities, researchers, and students to discuss the role that archaeology and traditional knowledge can play in the region’s response to the changing climate. Introduction Archaeological research in the Caribbean Basin has provided valuable information regarding how the region and its peoples have been impacted and responded to the changing climate over several millennia (e.g., Perdikaris and Boger 2022; Cooper 2012; Fitzpatrick 2012; Hofman and Hoogland 2015, 2016; Plew and Daggers 2022; Rivera-Collazo 2019; Whitehead et al. 2010). This research has highlighted adaptation strategies utilised by past populations which have been transmitted over generations and are evidenced in the archaeological and the traditional knowledge and practices record of Indigenous and local communities living in the Caribbean today, and manifested in the placement, organisation and relocation of settlements, housing construction, water and food procurement and management methods, and the development of resilience networks across islands (Cooper and Peros 2010; Hofman et al. 2021; Hofman and Hoogland 2015; Samson et al. 2015; Versteeg and Schinkel 1992). November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 79 Although the region has benefited from research on past climate variability and reconstruction demonstrating climate instability over the last several thousand years (Curtis et al. 2001; Hodell et al. 1991; Beets et al. 2006; Malaizé et al. 2011), there is still much to be learned about humanclimate relationships over time.In the Guianas component of the Caribbean in particular, much is still relatively unknown or inconclusive despite the support from regional palynological data (Boomert 1980; Bush et al. 2013; De Grandville 1982; Flautua et al. 2016; Hoock 1971; Roeleveld 1969; Rull 1999; Van der Hammen et al. 1964; Williams 2003). Holocene climatic data also offers some insight into past human adaptation to environments and demonstrates that past populations (particularly during the archaic age) played an essential role in shaping their landscape to increase resilience to the impacts of climate variability (Beets et al. 2006; Daggers et al. 2018; Daggers et al. 2022; Hofman et al. 2021; Williams 1985). Although we can infer based on scientific data regarding these adaptations, archaeology and traditional knowledge relating to climate change management provides an alternative and complementary means of understanding adaptation from the past to the present. This important intersection between archaeology, traditional knowledge and climate change is acknowledged, and was the focus of the workshop on 'Traditional Knowledge Solutions for Present and Future Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience in the Caribbean,' held in Aruba from November to December 2022 (see Figure 1). It brought together traditional and local communities, students, archaeologists, anthropologists, and other researchers from or working throughout the Caribbean, for a knowledge exchange and an initial "where are we?" discussion on how archaeological and traditional knowledge can support the elaboration of solutions and strategies for future climate change adaptation in the region. This initial discussion was deemed critical, as this nexus of archaeology and traditional knowledge for climate change adaptation is a relatively understudied area in the region, and so it was important to have insights on where things were at the regional level. Invitations were therefore sent to traditional communities, researchers and institutions known to be undertaking relevant research, with the aim being to have at least one 80 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Fig 1. The Aruba workshop: Traditional Knowledge Solutions for Present and Future Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience in the Caribbean, November 2022 researcher and one Indigenous or local community member from each participating country. The workshop provided an opportunity for the presentation of research in relation to traditional knowledge, archaeology and climate change adaptation intersections, support communities in articulating how they experienced and responded to climate change, discuss adaptation strategies, as well as the challenges preventing the availability and use of this knowledge at a wider society level. Importantly, it discussed the limited voice of Indigenous and local communities in climate change discourse in the Caribbean, and issues with the documentation of this knowledge in a free and informed manner that gives agency to these communities instead of merely extracting information. This was undoubtedly the beginning of a process where researchers and November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 81 communities combined their efforts in identifying the need for further research on these strategies, their documentation, and the eventual development of relevant case studies of traditional knowledge solutions and building greater awareness of the value of this intervention at the national and local levels. It is important to note that throughout this paper, the words Indigenous, traditional, and local knowledge are used. The term ‘traditional knowledge’ is used and is meant to convey knowledge, skills, and practices developed, sustained and passed on from generation to generation within a community’ and expressed through science, technology, ecology (and biodiversity), medicinal, and expressions1. Uses of the term Indigenous connote tribal or nativeness, and formal international definitions focus on historic continuity, distinctiveness, marginalisation, self-identity, and self-governance (Dove 2006: 192). The ILO (1989) for example, defines Indigenous as tribal peoples in independent countries whose social, cultural, and economic conditions distinguish them from other sections of the national community, and whose status is regulated wholly or partially by their own customs or traditions or by special laws or regulations; (b) peoples in independent countries who are regarded as Indigenous on account of their descent from populations which inhabited the country, or a geographical region to which the country belongs, at the time of conquest or colonisation or the establishment of present state boundaries and who, irrespective of their legal status, retain some or all their own social, economic, cultural and political institutions. [ILO 1989: Article 1.1]2 From the definitions provided, it can be inferred that while all Indigenous and local knowledge is traditional, not all traditional knowledge is Indigenous. The aim of this paper is not to debate who should be considered as 1 World Intellectual Property Office 2 Convention C169 - Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, 1989 (No. 169) (ilo.org) 82 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Indigenous in the Caribbean Basin, the indigeneity of the selected case study communities or even to interrogate the use of the word Indigenous by these communities. It instead recognizes the right of these communities to self-identify as Indigenous or traditional. Nevertheless, the word has been contested in the Caribbean when used by the Maroon and Garifuna communities who are mentioned throughout this paper. The case studies selected from the workshop for this paper include the Macushi in Guyana, Maroons in Suriname, and the Kalinago in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Dominica (see Figure 2). Although other identified Indigenous communities such as the Santa Rosa First Peoples from Trinidad and Tobago were present at the workshop in Aruba, it was not possible to include their case study within the context of this paper. The narrative elaborated by each case study demonstrates in some instances a stronger reliance on archaeological data or traditional knowledge and identifies differences in how data is understood and applied in each country. Therefore, the perspectives presented in these case studies are not Fig 2. Location of case studies within the Caribbean Basin November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 83 uniformed and are discussed from the approach taken by researchers and communities and their chosen areas of focus. They nevertheless represent the diverse stories of social adaptation through the combined voice of researchers and traditional communities. The case study from Guyana focuses on the importance of archaeology in identifying past adaptation strategies and examines complementarity with traditional knowledge, the Suriname case study discusses the experience of Maroon communities in relation to climate change and the application of their traditional knowledge, and finally, the Dominica and Saint Vincent case study highlights this human-environment and climate change dynamic through the temporal lens of the past, the present, and the future and specifically the loss of their archaeological heritage. Broader issues concerning public engagement in relation to Indigenous approaches, presented cases of social adaptation, strategies impacting public discourse, as well as workshop insights are discussed later in the paper. The Lokono, Macushi and Wapishana in Guyana Traditional knowledge systems of the Indigenous populations of Guyana complement the archaeological record by providing deep insights into the human-environmental relationships of the past and present and reinforce the importance of anthropogenic manipulation of the landscape for human adaptation to long-term ecological instability. An example of this is the clear demonstration of Indigenous land use actions in coastal adaptation practices during the Middle and Late Holocene human occupations. The anthropogenically built environment of northeastern Guyana with its habitation mounds and raised fields (see Figure 3) were engineered to adapt to local environmental conditions emerging during the Mid-Holocene, which saw rising river levels and seasonal savannah inundation with increasing rainfall (Plew and Daggers 2022; Williams 2003). This is supported by recent stable isotope composition data of human and faunal remains along the coast (Daggers et al. 2018, 2022). The human environment interaction and 84 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 material evidence produced in the Berbice, suggest a long-term influence on the area's ecology, ecosystem, and productivity, resulting from extensive landscape domestication, and interestingly, archaeological findings from the Berbice presented to coastal farmers in recent years have led to the adaptation of similar strategies for resilience building among vulnerable communities and has renewed the interest of such practices among the Indigenous communities along the Berbice river. Fig 3. Past Holocene cultural adaptation in Guyana: A - Image of Shell Midden Adaptation along the Northwestern Coast © Louisa Daggers, 2019 B - Raised Field Adaptation in the Berbice © George Simon, 1994 November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 85 Recent isotopic analysis of human and faunal remains across seven shellmidden sites (between 7500 cal. BP and 270 cal BP) in the northwestern littoral suggest warmer intervals in the early Holocene and stabilisation of the environment around 4000 BP (Daggers et al. 2018, 2022; Plew and Daggers 2022). These conditions appear to have influenced seasonal mobility and the increasing use of multiple resources supporting an increasingly sedentary way of life. Data from charcoal in sediments transported to four sites suggest a drier, more combustible environment (Daggers et al. 2018), as reported in South America, and possible anthropogenic fires for resource manipulation. As reflected in the archaeology of Northern Amazonia, anthropogenic activities and fire were important tools for adaptation by past populations to environmental change, though the extent of anthropogenic influences on landscape and resource management is not yet fully understood (McMichael et al. 2014; Pyne 1997; Walker 2012; Watling et al. 2018). To some degree human impacts on the Holocene landscape have been inferred based on the presence, absence and density of charcoal presented in dated stratigraphy of the Amazon and Guyana, suggesting increased fire regimens possibly because of landscape domestication resulting in vegetation changes (Daggers et al., 2018; Flautua et al. 2016; Hammond et al. 2006; Mayle and Power 2008, 2013; Tardy 1998). Many similar strategies identified in the archaeological record exist within contemporary Indigenous communities. The Lokono, Macushi and Wapishana continue to occupy and adapt savannah type environments and flood plains and rely heavily on traditional knowledge systems which constitute an essential aspect of social memory that is undervalued and quickly disappearing in Guyana. Landscape modification exhibited in the archaeological record remains critical to contemporary adaptations to unpredictable climatic conditions which continue to challenge adaptation practices among Indigenous and local communities. 86 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 As highlighted by co-author Annalisa Edwards3 from the Macushi Indigenous community, ‘our relationships with the environment enhance the overall health, resilience, and well-being of the Macushi people, and this knowledge has been transmitted and evolved from each generation to the next. It is through traditional knowledge systems that Indigenous people developed their unique way of life and have adapted to their local environment. This knowledge continues to be of great value to our survival as it is a part of who we are, our identity and culture, thus it also plays a vital role in areas such as food security and conservation amongst others.’ The Maroons of Suriname In the tropical rainforest interior of Suriname, Maroons, descendants of escaped enslaved Africans (see Figure 4), continue to live in areas negatively impacted by the effects of climate disasters (Jabini 2020: 4). However, the loss of food, the damage to and degradation of living areas and places of historical memory, has seemingly not affected the collective decision to remain in their traditional territory. This is perhaps connected to long-held traditional knowledge and practices that allowed for a swift recovery from crop and land degradation and settlement reconstruction in relation to climate-induced hazards (Hammond 2005). To explore this phenomenon, we consider the migration and settlement strategies the Maroons employed in the colonial period, and the role that traditional knowledge plays in how they adjusted to changes in climate and in identifying adaptation strategies in the archaeological record. In Suriname, 73% of deforestation is caused by illegal and legal gold mining (see Figure 5) (AAE 2017: 15). The consequences are the loss of biodiversity, damage from heavy rainfall, flooding, landslides in the interior, and other environmental effects (GoS 2019-2029). The accumulation of 3 Annalisa Edwards, personal communication 2023 to co-author Louisa Daggers November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 87 Fig. 4. Map of Maroon tribes in Suriname these issues means that Suriname must contend with the ongoing effects of climate-induced hazards exacerbated by the afore-mentioned issues. However, a significant issue in the management of the impacts of climate change is a lack of data (IDB 2021). To close this data gap, Maroons and Amerindian peoples have been identified as a mitigation proxy to encourage the promotion and awareness of non-timber forest products, ecotourism, medicinal plants, and agroforestry practices. The success of this strategy however requires an understanding of the historical ecological ties these communities have with their landscape. The choice of a settlement can be derived from two historical factors. The first was safety from the colonial onslaught, and the second was sustainability. Safe locations could be clandestine transient locales or abandoned Amerindian settlements appropriated by the escaping enslaved between 1680 and 1720 (Scholtens 1994:16). Tributaries deep in the primary forests provided terrestrial 88 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Fig. 5. Deforestation due to small-scale mining (Source: Amazon Conservation Team website) resources that served as escape routes (Hublin 1989). In the late eighteenth to nineteenth centuries, sustainable settlements fostered a sedentary way of life. They can be characterised by the accessibility to a broader variety of terrestrial and aquatic resources, subsistence farming, surplus storage, and high-ground settlements to avoid flooding. In an interesting juxtaposition of safety and sustainability and as an adaptation strategy, Maroon women ensured food security – particularly in times of flooding - by storing surplus food in a different location from the primary village, as well as maintaining auxiliary farmlands (De Groot 1978:17-18; Dragtenstein 2002: 122-123; Jagdew 2014: 48). Maroons also believe that settlements were determined by the apuku (forest spirits). More importantly, the matrilineal and matrilocal descent order determines that the clans within a tribe ascribe to a permanent geographic area, utilising the resources therein and establishing fixed ancestral territories. These would have serious implications for how relocation would be pursued November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 89 in times of severe environmental or climate-related events as centuries of traditional knowledge connect people with areas. This socio-cultural development contributes to why Maroon tribes do not leave flooded areas (Jabini 2020: 4-5; Scholtens 1994: 148). The 1960s forced relocation of twenty-eight Maroon villages to construct the van Blommenstein hydroelectric dam in the Suriname River was an exception, destroying a portion of Saamaka's traditional territory and likely some land use traditions in the process (Scholtens 1994: 153). During the nineteenth century, bush meat and timber trade became dependent on seasonality (Boomgaard 1992). At this time, the cyclical nature of the climate and its predictability meant communities could prepare and plan. In the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Saamaka Maroons of the Upper Suriname River logged primary forest hardwood in the wet season. At this time, the high-water levels allowed felled timber to be easily transported by a river raft. Felling and transport was a collective kin-based activity (Boomgaard 1992). Conversely, episodes of dry period forest fires overlap with eighteenth century Maroon sedentism. In 1746, 1769, 1779, 1797, and 1825, large forest fires lasting for a month or more may have destroyed more forest vegetation than felling (Boomgaard 1992: 217). Slash and burn shifting cultivation would have also increased during this period but was not harmful to the environment (ibid). All these activities would become a part of the Maroon collective traditional culture, as traditional knowledge is passed from one generation to another through oral testimony and is the root of cultural behaviour. Some Maroons have immortalised climate phenomena. Historically, the Ndjuka of the Tapanahony River interpreted the exposed portion of rock outcrops in the river as a sign of an impending water level rise. The watermark level was a notification that abnormal flooding would occur, prompting villagers to temporarily retreat to sloped planting grounds kilometres inland 90 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Fig 6. Inscription of the 1949 flooding event in the village Abenaston on the Suriname River © Cheryl White, 2022 from the river4. In the village Abenaston, the Saamaka acknowledge a 1949 flooding event with an inscription that reads ‘bigie watra’ meaning high water level (see Figure 6). In the early 1970s, the Pamaka of the Marowijne River experienced an unusual flooding event which they refer to as ‘a kon kii mi’ (it's come to kill me) (Jabini 2020). Their response was to retreat to their sloped planting grounds or reside in outboard motorboats until the water receded. After flooding, rituals restored the significance of cemeteries, worship sites, and medicine houses. These traditional responses have helped Maroons anticipate climate events and determine alternate landscape use. Maroons and their landscape-based kinship have strategically adapted within a narrow geographical and topographical scope. The distribution of Maroon communities reflects some measure of a geographic selection process. Archaeological evidence suggests that in their formative period, Maroons were appropriating pre-Columbian ring ditch sites located at the confluence 4 Personal Communication of Malonti (2022) to co-author Cheryl White November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 91 of low-lying creeks in the densely forested interior and used defensively for the historical purpose of being clandestinely safe. Radiometric dating suggests a late archaic pre-Columbian presence, and an eighteenth-century Maroon occupation, further substantiated by oral historical testimonials (Versteeg 2003; White 2010). We know that Maroons exist close to their ancestral settlements, which reflect the collective decision for ecological exploitation based primarily on nuclear and affinal kin affiliation. Sustainable living areas near riverbanks may characterise the broader settlement landscape. Here, phytolith analysis of non-Indigenous plant species of banana (Musaceae) and rice (Oryza) with mixed pre-Columbian and historic period ceramic assemblages indicates crop variation and possible trade (Witteveen et al. 2023). The shifting cultivation plots with extra storage on the slopes of low mountains of the heavily forested interior would indicate the use of more traditional ground provisions, like manioc, susceptible to root rot if left in standing water. During flash flooding, ground provisions are harvested, and there is reliance on extended kin from neighbouring villages as all wait for the normalisation of water levels. At that time, household tasks such as washing, and food preparation are sometimes performed from boats. As drought and flooding are the main climatic challenges experienced by Maroons living in their traditional territory, there is an increased likelihood of inaccessibility due to dependency on boat or plane travel. Moreover, episodes of drought can lead to poor harvest and lack of terrestrial resources that migrate elsewhere in the forest. As access to potable water food resources decreases, government dependence for food distribution will increase (Headley 2023). Co-author Thanya Soké Fonkel of the Saamaka Maroon Tribe notes that ‘adaptation strategies to severe changes in nature are the bedrock of the existence of Maroon communities. Climate change is a somewhat new concept for us, and it is unimaginable that it has the potential to make nature our enemy and that we may be in danger of losing our ancestral bond to it.’ Maroons are also affected by a globalising western world, exacerbating acculturation and enculturation within the broader Surinamese society, and as a result, the transfer of traditional knowledge within communities cannot 92 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 be assumed (Granderson 2017; Scholtens 1994). Despite the destruction of property and loss of food resources, responses to recent flooding events in 2006, 2007, 2008, 2017, 2021 and 2022 demonstrate that each tribe is affixed to a prescribed landscape. Combining traditional knowledge with the geographic modelling of historic landscape choices (seasonal exploitation sites, variegated vegetation, and diverse settlement types with an Amerindian and historic component) may also help identify threatened archaeological sites and expand our knowledge of the Maroon landscape. The Indigenous people of Wai'tukubuli and Youloumain The present-day Indigenous Kalinago of the Commonwealth of Dominica (Wai’tukubuli) and St. Vincent (Youloumain) and the Grenadines are the descendants of the Island Carib or Kalinago people who are widely believed to have occupied the islands of the Lesser Antilles in the late pre-colonial and early colonial times. Although migrations and habitation in this archipelago are subject to ongoing debates, archaeological research points to human groups living in this part of the Lesser Antilles by c. 4000 cal. BP (Keegan and Hofman 2017). It is generally believed that the Island Carib originated from the coastal areas of the Guianas and moved in to and subsequently inhabited the Lesser Antillean archipelago and specifically the Windward Islands (southern portion of the Lesser Antilles) before European colonisation and onward (Boomert 1995; Bright 2011; Whitehead and Hulme 1992). From the early seventeenth century, European powers through the French, English, and Dutch, colonised the Lesser Antilles which contributed to a significant reduction in the number of Indigenous people and resulted in their loss of control over much of the archipelago, leading to the Indigenous presence remaining only in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Dominica (Honychurch 2000; Wilson 1997). In the case of Dominica, the Kalinago were relegated to the Carib (Kalinago) Territory, which was formed by the colonial administration in 1903 (Hulme and Whitehead 1992). As archaeological research contributes to the availability of more information on these Indigenous societies, so too are present-day November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 93 archaeological research programmes and studies contributing to new ways of examining the relationship of the Kalinago with their natural environment through reviewing the impacts of climate change. In this context, the archaeology, traditional knowledge, and climate action dynamic are examined through the loss of Kalinago archaeological sites due to climate change phenomena, how these communities experience and respond to this loss, the utilisation of Indigenous knowledge to respond to the changing climate, and opportunities where this ‘heritage connection' contributes to climate awareness and/or advocacy. Another important consideration is that the loss of these archaeological sites prevents research on examining adaptation strategies utilised by coastal communities. Archaeological research has provided evidence of the extent of impacts of climate-induced hazards on coastal archaeological sites along the Dominican and Vincentian coastline. In many cases, the process of coastal erosion is exacerbated by sand mining and other development activities (Hofman and Hoogland 2016), the site of Brighton Beach in Saint Vincent being one such example. Here, the first-hand accounts of co-authors Sardo Sutherland (Kalinago from Saint Vincent) and Irvince Nanichi Auguiste (Kalinago from Dominica) are transmitted through two examples in discussing this humanenvironment and climate change relationship through the temporal lens of the past, the present, and the future. Brighton Beach is a Kalinago settlement site located on the Atlantic southeastern portion of the island of Saint Vincent. In addition to co-authors Sardo Sutherland and Irvince Nanichi Auguiste, other members of the Saint Vincent Kalinago and Garifuna communities collaborated with local and international researchers in surveys at the site in 2019 and 2023 (see Figure 7). This collaboration would also feature at the airport development threatened Argyle site, also in Saint Vincent. Here, Sardo and Irvince provide their accounts regarding participating in an activity concerning one of their sites being impacted by climate change. The site has been described as essential to learning about the island's sociocultural pre-contact processes and contributing to reconstructing the 94 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Fig 7. Sardo Sutherland and Irvince Naniche Auguiste participating in rescue archaeology at the eroding Brighton Beach pre-Columbian site in Saint Vincent © Corinne Hofman, 2019 pre-Columbian past of the Windward Islands and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines archipelago specifically (Boomert et al. 2017). Sardo Sutherland: After the 1979 eruption of La Soufrière, I moved to attend school in Brighton. I learned of the beach and the site from history lessons and used to go there to cut grass. I saw many artefacts and the coastal erosion taking place. I was interested but did not get seriously involved till excavations at another Kalinago site - Argyle5. There, my horizon widened about the work 5 Excavations at Argyle were undertaken in response to the site being impacted by the construcNovember 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 95 of archaeologists. During these excavations at Argyle and Brighton, many schools and other community members came to see the excavations. I felt honoured to participate in an excavation at a settlement site of my ancestors. Unfortunately, in the case of Brighton, we have lost this site that I interacted with as a young man. I am sure we have also lost many more to the encroaching sea and waves. Irvince Nanichi Auguiste: I became involved with Brighton Beach while working at the Argyle site. Archaeology and examining our sites has taught us so much about our Indigenous history. However, more research is needed, particularly in palynology. We need to learn more about how our ancestors lived in their spaces and interacted more keenly with their landscapes. We cannot make the critical connections if we continue losing these sites to coastal erosion, flooding, and rising sea levels. We also need to participate in activities to better monitor and protect these sites. Both Sardo and Irvince acknowledge that their experience at Brighton Beach has increased their awareness of other sites impacted by climate phenomena. Sardo: The coastal Kalinago village of Sandy Bay was previously relocated due to severe and ongoing flooding. The area we are now located is called New Sandy Bay, and unfortunately, it is also being impacted by severe coastal erosion and the encroaching sea. In this case, the New Sandy Bay Kalinago community has observed these ongoing effects, reflected on past events, and continues to document present tion of the new airport. This activity was truly a collaborative effort including the Garifuna, Kalinago, heritage managers in Saint Vincent and international research partners. 96 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Fig 8. Community map initiative highlighting areas lost or impacted by climateinduced and other natural hazards © Augustine ‘Sardo’ Sutherland impact. With these actions, the community seeks to build advocacy for measures to protect their coastline and society, starting with a map (see Figure 8) that details coastal areas caught up between volcanic eruptions and coastal erosion (Sutherland 2021)6. The government is now building a sea defence extending from Georgetown to Sandy Bay, with some consultations being organised for persons who needed to evacuate homes along the coast. However, there has been no widespread consultation regarding the approach to protecting the coastline and whether the community might have cultural solutions or mitigation strategies based on their traditional knowledge having co-existed in that environment for a long time. Irvince highlights that 'Indigenous knowledge could be better integrated and using excavated archaeological information could be better promoted. Indigenous knowledge is not lost as it is naturally occurring and ‘hidden in the brain,’ although there has been a decrease in environmental observations. 6 Co-author Sutherland, Augustine ‘Sardo’ of the Sandy Bay Kalinago community in discussion with lead author Andrea Richards, 2021 November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 97 This is due to Kalinago students moving out of communities for secondary education (see also Auguiste and Hofman 2022). Both highlight that traditional practices used to adapt to the changing climate could be better illustrated, documented, and promoted for use by the wider society. One example of this is traditional building practices in relation to houses, which are durable or easily reconstructed when faced with severe weather events such as tropical cyclones. These houses featured (among other elements) high-pitched roofs that enabled fast rainwater run-off and minimal hurricane-wind lifting (see Figure 9) Discussion A discussion of archaeology's intersection with the changing climate in the Caribbean and, by extension, our climate action and narrative requires not just an examination of past adaptation strategies but also an interrogation of how these past responses can inform present-day strategies, how Indigenous and local communities experience the loss of their sites from climate-induced hazards and are empowered to safeguard them, and the community-centred narratives which can emanate from this dynamic contributing to climate change actions, literacy, and advocacy. The research presented here by Caribbean researchers and Indigenous communities demonstrates that there is a critical place for archaeology and traditional knowledge in building our resilience and surmounting environmental instability as a region from the deep past to the present and also highlighting that through archaeology, there are varied opportunities to identify the factors that promoted the development of adaptation strategies in the past, which apply to us in the region and provide alternative solutions as we face a future of severe climate variability. Presenting this data to present day coastal communities led to renewed interest in these adaptation strategies, which would also be further adapted as it enters the social memory of presentday communities. These areas nevertheless require further research and documentation while encouraging more transformative knowledge exchange with Indigenous and local communities. There is also the unfortunate context 98 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 of some of these adaptation strategies being lost from the social memory of Indigenous, coastal, and other local communities In addition to a compilation of some of the useful adaptation strategies being utilised by traditional communities within the Caribbean Basin, an important highlight emanating from the workshop was the need for improved documentation of these strategies or solutions and their conversion into formats for use by non-culture actors. This was identified as the next steps in this ongoing process to be actioned during future collaborations and through the established online platform combining communities and researchers. As such, another activity will be planned which addresses documentation and conversion into a usable format with case studies for non-culture actors. As it relates to other societal sectors, there are indeed areas where the data from climate change archaeology can prove valuable in the elaboration of local strategies in relation to agriculture, food security and water management, housing construction, and settlement location. This culturally focused research is an important place to better engage with those responsible for policy and climate action programming, thereby ensuring a more holistic environmental approach geared towards sustainability in the Caribbean Basin Acknowledgments We acknowledge the contribution of the many voices from local and Indigenous communities that have edified this research, and the important feedback provided by Professor Corinne Hofman. This paper emanates from discussions at the workshop on Traditional Knowledge Solutions for Present and Future Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience in the Caribbean, which was supported by the Island(er)s at the Helm and CaribTRAILS projects (2019 – 2026) through funding received from the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO), the UNESCO Cluster Office for the Caribbean, and the National Archaeological Museum of Aruba. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 99 Fig 9. Example of 'A-Frame': Hurricane hits on one side of the building © Andrea Richards, 2018 100 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 References Aitchison, K., German, P., and Rocks-Macqueen, D. 2021. Profiling the Profession, Landward Research Ltd, Profiling the Profession 2020: Introduction – Profiling the Profession accessed on 5th March 2023. Andrews, G., and Thomas, R. 1995. The Management of Archaeological Projects: Theory and practice in the UK In Cooper, M.A., Firth, A,. 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The world after PPG16: 21st-century challenges for archaeology, Report for Historic England and CIfA, https://www.archaeologists.net/sites/default/files/projects/21st-century%20Challenges%20for%20Archaeology%20project%20report%20October%202018.pdf accessed on 11th March 2023. YA (York Archaeology) 2022, Archaeology on Prescription, https://community.yorkarchaeology.co.uk/index.php/archaeology-on-prescription/ accessed on 13th September 2023. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 105 From Soot to Saplings: Integrating Industrial Pasts into Public Demands for Environmental Sustainability Kieran Gleave Department of Archaeology/Sidney Sussex College, University of Cambridge [email protected] Abstract At a time when environmental sustainability is demanded across the public spectrum, the pollutive and productive legacies of the industrial past are increasingly viewed as antitheses of our visions for greener futures. Moving forwards, the public-facing professional, governmental, volunteer and commercial networks which manage Britain’s industrial archaeologies and heritages face a challenging task: integrating industrial pasts with contentious climate legacies into public visions for environmental sustainability. To explore potential avenues for this integration, this article discusses trophic and passive approaches to ‘rewilding’ defunct industrial sites and landscapes. By drawing from visits to the National Trust’s Castlefield Viaduct Pilot Project and the Upper Peak Forest Canal, I explore the merits of each rewilding strategy and discuss their potentials to secure sustainable re-uses for industrial sites: both those presently defunct and those which face closure through future deindustrialisation. Introduction The futures of localised ecosystems and global climates are core public concerns in contemporary Britain. As broader publics and public-facing organisations strive towards achieving environmental sustainability, the productive and pollutive pasts of the eighteenth to twentieth centuries loom as roots of our climate woes (Birkeland 2017: 62). This was affirmed in a speech by Mia Mottley (Prime Minister of Barbados) at COP27 in November 2022, when she cited historic industrialisation as causing the climate crisis now faced by the Global South (Greenfield et al. 2022). A year earlier, in anticipation of 106 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 COP26, Nick Ralls (CEO of the Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust) stressed the importance of acknowledging the roles that historic industry has played in underpinning contemporary climate change (Miskin and Madden 2021). Indeed, some defunct industrial sites continue to pose environmental challenges through the presence of ground contaminants and other hazardous substances (Quivik 2022: 343; Tempel 2012: 143-4). Yet, in contrast with this grim vision of smog and soot, several industrial sites and landscapes have undergone an ecological reformation of sorts (Historic England 2018:1). Following the termination of their historic functions, these places and spaces now uphold local ecosystems and serve as unlikely habitats for flora and fauna (Bartolini and DeSilvey 2020: 45; Box 1999: 138; DeSilvey 2017: 3). This process of ‘rewilding’, which necessitates the “repair or refurbishment of an ecosystem’s functionality through the (re) introduction of selected species” (Pettorelli et al. 2019: 1), can be accomplished through ‘trophic’ or ‘passive’ approaches: the former necessitates the managed reintroduction of lost floral and faunal species, while the latter entails minimal human intervention (Wang et al. 2023). These processes are well understood in the contexts of industrial archaeology and heritage (Edensor 2005: 42-50; Palmer 2022: 710; Palmer and Neaverson 1998: 155), yet little has been done to explore the extents that their implementation at defunct industrial sites can be synchronised with public calls for environmental sustainability. In this article, my discussion centres around how ‘trophic’ and ‘passive’ approaches to rewilding industrial sites can assist in facilitating this synchronisation. To accomplish this, I draw from visits to the National Trust’s Castlefield Viaduct Pilot Project (Manchester, England) and the Upper Peak Forest Canal (Cheshire and Derbyshire, England) which I made in February 2023. From this, I discuss the merits of each rewilding approach and reflect on how they might inspire the creation of adaptable and sustainable policy frameworks or management strategies for historic industrial sites, as well as those that face closure through future deindustrialisation. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 107 Environmental Sustainability and Heritage A central pillar of contemporary public climate discourse, which unifies government policy, the aims of activist groups and an array of public organisations, is the desire to attain and practice environmental sustainability (Just Stop Oil 2023; UK Government 2013). While the definition and plan for attaining ‘environmental sustainability’ differs greatly across the public spectrum, the essence of the term implies minimising any form of human activity which may damage natural environments, be they small-scale ecosystems or global climates. From this understanding, rewilding is an environmentally sustainable management practice that facilitates the holistic long-term recovery of natural environments. In the spheres of heritage management and its literature, the physical facets of environmental sustainability have received great attention. Chief among these are the creation and implementation of strategies for reducing carbon footprints at managed heritage attractions. In industrial heritage, questions over the continued uses of fossil fuels and the adaptive re-use of industrial buildings have dominated the sustainability discourse (Historic England 2023; Holmes 2021; Ministry of Housing, Communities and Government 2019: 54-57; Nevell 2021; Palmer et al. 2012: 34). While this paradigm is certainly of merit, it has been criticised for its tendency to overlook the cultural dimensions of environmental sustainability (Fouseki et al. 2022: 7). In a broader sense, “sustaining heritage means sustaining value” (Mason 2022:17). These ‘values’ are inherently multifaceted and are under constant renewal and renegotiation by those in the present (Smith 2006). Therefore, achieving environmental sustainability, in the context of rewilding defunct industrial sites, requires a long-term approach that needs to be rigid enough to facilitate environmental recovery, yet malleable enough to integrate and adapt to the public’s alternate and shifting notions of ‘heritage value’ (Curran et al. 2022: 61). As many public or public-orientated groups are stakeholders in Britain’s industrial heritage, their empowerment is essential in securing longterm environmental sustainability (Landorf 2009: 496; Shackel 2022: 10). 108 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Towards Public Archaeology To explore how this might be achieved, I look to public archaeology, a multifaceted research paradigm that examines how archaeologies and heritages intersect across public spheres (Little 2012: 395; Moshenska 2017: 6). In the contexts of public engagement, archaeology and heritage are frequently cited for their values as tools which benefit public education, as well as physical and mental wellbeing (Bartoy 2012: 564; Thomas 2017: 24). This is no exception in industrial archaeology and heritage, with the dissemination of publicfacing booklets and active public participation in archaeological practice being credited for their public benefits (Redhead 2021). When we look specifically towards the public benefits of re-naturalised industrial landscapes, discussions focus on how public immersion in such landscapes can bolster their physical and mental wellbeing (Clarke 2020; Gould 2015: 81). They are places that permit exercise, relaxation, a range of social activities and allow publics to get closer to nature. The recognition and communication of the present public benefits of environmentally transformed industrial sites and landscapes have been essential; especially when one considers the historic difficulties in capturing public interest in industrial heritage, and the contentious climate legacies which surround the industrial past (APPGIH 2019: 26; Oglethorpe 2014: 90). However, I argue that a fixation on present public benefits does not challenge us to reflect on how rewilding processes can synchronise with public visions for long-term environmental sustainability. This is because this approach predominantly curates the present relevance of the industrial past and seldom integrates the public as long-term stakeholders in the archaeological discourse (Franklin and Moe 2012: 575). As has been stated thus far, heritage sustainability is a long-term process that unifies the past, present and future and orientates them towards long-term action and stakeholder integration. To break this past-present binary, I look beyond the ways that rewilded industrial sites presently intersect across public spheres, and instead consider the extents that they can become integrated within public visions for greener futures. Through this reframing, I argue that there is a requirement November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 109 to strike a holistic balance that mediates the industrial past, public present and environmental future. I believe that this approach would sustain public interest in and value of rewilded industrial sites, while ensuring that the longterm visions for these sites remain adaptive to any future movements in the public discourse of environmental sustainability. In short, it is imperative that we begin to think ahead and reflect on how rewilding can be synchronised within this future-orientated public discourse. Having stressed the importance of accommodating this synchronisation, I now move to examine the individual merits of trophic and passive rewilding strategies as tools that may contribute towards the public’s long-term goals for environmental sustainability. The Castlefield Viaduct Pilot Project I begin by drawing from the National Trust’s Castlefield Viaduct Pilot Project as an example of trophic rewilding. To facilitate this discussion, I draw from data I collected during my visit to the pilot in February 2023. This includes notes based on conversations with National Trust staff members, photographs of public interpretation panels and reflections on public engagement which I witnessed or noted during my visit. Historic Background Designated as a Grade II listed structure in 1994 (Historic England 1994), the Castlefield Viaduct (fig.1) was built over the Castlefield Canal Basin in 1892/3 during the late nineteenth-century expansion of Manchester’s intercity railway system (McNeil and Nevell 2000: 8; National Trust 2023a). The concentrated spread of textile mills and other industries within central Manchester demanded an extensive network of railway lines, stations and warehouses to meet huge demands to import and export raw materials and finished products (Madgin 2010: 33; Wild 2018: 74). To this end, the Castlefield Viaduct accommodated the movement of passenger trains to Manchester Central Station and heavy rail traffic in and out of the adjacent 110 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 1: A general view of the Castlefield Viaduct, taken from within the Castlefield Basin. Image: Gleave (2023). Great Northern Warehouse (Hartwell 2001: 264); the latter representing one of the largest and most complex goods interchanges in Britain at the time (Historic England 1996; McNeil and Nevell 2000: 12). The Castlefield Viaduct’s location within the heart of industrial Manchester necessitates that it has several deeply rooted connections to historic climate change and environmental degradation. Perhaps most obvious are the fleets of locomotives that travelled in abundance over the Viaduct between 1893 –1969 (National Trust 2023a). One cannot overlook the climate impacts of the raw goods and finished products that were transported across the viaduct. By the late nineteenth century, imported goods and finished products were transported into and out of Manchester on steamboats and railways, which cumulatively consumed millions of tons of coal per year. Further, the mills and other ancillary industries which earned the city the titles of ‘Cottonopolis’ November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 111 and ‘Workshop of the World’, were largely powered by coal and gas (McNeil and Nevell 2000: 7). In short, the Viaduct was elemental in enabling further industrial expansion of the city, which propagated further environmental harm. Abandonment and Pilot Project Amidst the post-war economic restructuring of Britain, Manchester’s industrial fortunes ran dry as the English textile industry shrank and international labour markets shifted abroad. In 1969, goods trains stopped traversing the Castlefield Viaduct as industries folded across the city centre. The rails were removed and the ballast became strewn with buddleia and overgrowth. In July 2022, the National Trust launched a 12-month-long pilot project to transform a section of the 330-meter-long Castlefield Viaduct into an ‘Urban Sky Park’ (fig.2). Inspired by New York’s High Line walk, this project represents an attempt to enhance the existing ecological diversity on the Viaduct through trophic rewilding (Forsyth 2022). This has involved the creation of public green space along the first third of the viaduct, which has been populated with pollinatorfriendly local plant varieties (National Trust 2023b; Pidd 2022). By booking a free ticket, visiting publics are encouraged to utilise the space for physical and mental wellbeing. While this approach echoes the established paradigm of curating the present public benefits of rewilding, the pilot goes one step further by soliciting public feedback by offering “the opportunity to explore the viaduct and share ideas about the future of this historic structure” (National Trust 2023b). In my own experience, this is achieved through post-visit online questionnaires, response forms and an indoor space where visitors can share their thoughts with staff members. In the contexts of recognising the public as long-term stakeholders, this style of future-orientated public consultation is a welcome development. 112 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 2: A view of rewilded section of the National Trust’s ongoing (at time of publication) pilot at the Castlefield Viaduct. Image: Gleave (2023). The Merits of Trophic Rewilding My visit highlighted two overarching merits of trophic rewilding as a strategy for rewilding presently defunct industrial sites. First, as trophic rewilding is an innately managed process with long-term aims for environmental sustainability, it has the potential to integrate and retain an array of public or public-facing stakeholders within decision-making processes. As is illustrated by the pilot at Castlefield, trophic rewilding permits the collection and integration of public feedback into the long-term environmental management of the site. While it is too early to draw any deeper conclusions about how the public perceives the trophic rewilding of the viaduct, the staff members I spoke with and the forms of public feedback I saw during my visit (fig.3), suggests a predominantly positive public reaction to the pilot. If, in a ‘worst case’ scenario, post-pilot analyses of public feedback suggest public November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 113 disapproval with the project, or conclude that there is demand for aspects of the project to be altered in the future, acting upon this feedback will allow the project to remain aligned with public demands and values. It is important to note here that trophic rewilding projects are exercises of public imagination as much as they are of physical transformation (Angelo 2020: 147). As stated previously, environmentally-sustainable planning strategies can only be sustained in of themselves if they account for and integrate the array of socio-cultural values that the public ascribes to the industrial past. In this sense, I suggest that trophic rewilding permits the socio-cultural values of public stakeholders to be understood and integrated into the viaduct’s environmentally-oriented management plan. This is essential for retaining the public as long-term stakeholders as the viaduct’s environmental and cultural Figure 3: The public feedback wall within a temporary building on the viaduct. This space allows visiting publics to communicate their thoughts on the future of the Viaduct. Image: Gleave (2023). 114 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 values inevitably shift in the future. Second, trophic rewilding affords a degree of control over how and to what extent an industrial site adapts to public calls for environmental sustainability. The rapid re-development of urban centres during their de-industrialisation has seldom prioritised the construction of new greenspaces until recently. In a twist of irony, most greenspaces and parks within British cities were created during the high tide of industrialisation, with few having been designated since (White 2022). While access to greenspace is certainly beneficial for contemporary public wellbeing, greenspaces themselves are also essential for sustaining ecosystems, in contexts of long-term urban development and intensification. By instigating the trophic rewilding of the viaduct, I argue that the pilot has offered an environmentally sustainable future for the structure while affording the public a greatly needed greenspace within the city. In the broader contexts of integrating defunct industrial sites into public visions for environmental sustainability, I suggest that trophic rewilding approaches are of particular merit in urbanised contexts, which either lack publicly-accessible greenspace or contain larger industrial buildings which cannot be easily adapted due to complexities associated with their physical form. Most importantly, I believe that trophic rewilding permits the sustainable integration of public stakeholders, and their perspectives, into the environmental futures of defunct industrial sites. Such stakeholder integration is key if these sites are to align with public cultural values and adapt to future shifts in public environmental values. The Upper Peak Forest Canal Having outlined the potential public and environmental benefits of trophic rewilding strategies, I now shift to examine passive rewilding approaches. To achieve this, I look to the Upper Peak Forest Canal, which has become gradually re-naturalised after decades of abandonment. To permit this discussion, I draw from desk-based studies of published material, a series of notes and photographs that I compiled after walking the route of the canal from the Macclesfield Junction (Marple) to the Bugsworth Basin (Whaley November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 115 Bridge), and my own reflections as a long-term resident in the area. History and ecological transformation Constructed for transporting quarried limestone and ‘quicklime’ (burned limestone) from the Dark Peak to the industrial hubs of Manchester, work on the Upper Peak Forest Canal commenced in 1794 and was finalised by 1804/5 (Ashworth et al. 1977: 105). The extracted limestone was transported on horse-drawn canal barges and was subsequently burned in kilns for later use as agricultural fertilisers, mortar, or ‘lime wash’ for coating walls (Hulme 1924: 216; Leach 1995: 145). Walking along the 6.9-mile route today, one will encounter the archaeological remains of several limekilns, warehouses, wharves, tramway systems and coal mines, which are tangible testimonies of this once eminent local industry (Littlechilds and Page 2015: 9-47; Steyne and Crowe 2022: 398). While the initial processes of quarrying and transporting limestone had minimal environmental impacts, the burning of limestone in kilns, which was done at the Bugsworth Basin and Marple, demanded a constant supply of coal to regulate kiln temperatures of around 900°C (Bishop et al. 2017: 38). This released vast quantities of carbon emissions and scarred the landscape by encouraging the mining of local coal seams, which in turn contaminated groundwater and river systems (Leach 1995: 148; Rurek et al. 2022: 2). Two centuries later, the landscape of the Upper Peak Forest Canal has been passively rewilded. The coal mines in the area have been capped off, and the kilns at Bugsworth and Marple lie dormant under matrices of brambles, ferns and ash trees (fig.4). The canal towpaths and waterways are now tranquil settings for walking, picnicking and leisure boating. Herons and kingfishers scout the waters for fish, and the banks of the canal are populated by woodlands and pasture. This environmental rejuvenation has recently earned the Upper Peak Forest Canal both Green Flag accreditation and Historic England’s new Green Heritage Site Award (Green Flag 2023). Further, the canal has been recognised as a wildlife corridor that allows “animals to move across the landscape and through unsuitable habitats”, 116 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 4: The remains of an overgrown limekiln, located within the Bugsworth Basin, Derbyshire. Image: Gleave (2023). resulting in the designation of three environmentally-valued ‘local sites’ along its route (Baldacchino 2016: 22). The passive rewilding of historic industrial sites and landscapes is by no means a ground-breaking revelation. Several key academic publications have explored the positive outcomes that often accompany such processes (Bartolini and DeSilvey 2020: 39; Desilvey 2017; Edensor 2005). Indeed, during my visit to the Upper Peak Forest Canal, I noted several public-facing interpretation panels which communicated how this rewilding contributes to the present environmental value of the landscape (fig.5). However, as I have touched upon several times thus far, there is a requirement to look beyond the present public and environmental benefits of rewilding, and instead consider how it can be synchronised with future-orientated public goals for environmental sustainability. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 117 The Merits of Passive Rewilding Through my visit to the Upper Peak Forest Canal, I noted two benefits of the passive rewilding of the landscape. The first of these is the sustainment of local ‘ecotourism’ which, by attracting visitors and canal boaters to the area, continues to economically and culturally benefit local publics (Canal and River Trust 2023; Jackson 2019: 7). While this harks to the present benefits of the regenerated natural landscape, the slow pace of natural restoration has permitted local publics to gradually position themselves as grassroot stakeholders who now stand to benefit from the future of the re-naturalised environment. This is evident in the array of local public charities, volunteer groups and businesses that are now actively implicated in caring for the natural environment and curating its industrial past for visitors (Marple Website 2023a; Wilshaw 2019). Second, and leading from this point, is that the passively rewilded landscape has come to represent a cornerstone of local place identity. By allowing the landscape to rewild itself, the canal has gained a degree of publicly appreciated aesthetic distinction, especially among residents who remember its earlier days when pollution levels were higher. For example, landscape and wildlife shots taken along the landscape are popular within public digital spheres, as are artworks depicting industrial canal buildings and narrowboats (Marple Website 2023b). Drawing from these two points, I believe that the primary merit of passive rewilding defunct industrial sites and landscapes lies in the gradual environmental recovery that it facilitates. In the case of the Upper Peak Forst Canal, the rejuvenation of the natural landscape has taken decades. I argue that the extended public exposure to gradual environmental recovery has inadvertently permitted local publics to craft their own cultural values and identities into their visions for the future of the landscape and has encouraged grassroots action. While the sustainment of ‘ecotourism’ and propagation of local place identity, as witnessed along the Upper Peak Forst Canal, is not a guaranteed model if applied elsewhere, my claim here is that passive rewilding has the potential to encourage, motivate and sustain local publics to position themselves as long-term stakeholders. This is key in permitting the long-term 118 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 5: An interpretation panel at the Bugsworth Basin which communicates the ecological resurgence of the landscape to visitors. Image: Gleave (2023). integration of former industrial sites within public visions for environmental sustainability. Looking Back to Move Forwards: Rewilded Industrial Pasts in Deindustrial Futures My discussion of rewilding thus far has focused on synchronising presently defunct industrial sites into public ambitions for environmental sustainability. While this is an important avenue of discussion, allow me to redirect attention back to the global climate concerns renewed at COP27. Chief among these is that active industrial activity is as much of an environmental concern for contemporary publics as those of the industrial past (Berger and Pickering 2018: 216; McGrath 2022). Though Britain’s core historic industries have mostly subsided as capital flow has shifted industry overseas, active industrial sites and landscapes associated with production, power generation and transport are still found across the landscape today, though in far smaller November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 119 concentrations. At present, legislation stresses the importance of adopting renewable energy sources, limiting the creation of pollutive waste and mitigating the release of harmful by-products into natural environments (Environment Agency 2021). One needs to look no further than shifting international markets, or Britain’s weakened economy, to realise that active industries are not impervious to the same economic movements or ruptures which eroded their historic predecessors (Gross 1993: 118). This was illustrated in January 2023, when the Unite Union announced that the British steel industry was "a whisker away from collapse", placing thousands of jobs at risk (Ashdown 2023). From this plainly economic account, it is not outlandish to suggest that international competition, the depletion of natural resources, or new environmental policies, will contribute to some degree of future de-industrialisation. As with the historic industrial sites of our time, the termination of active industry in the future will likely present us with the same challenge: synchronising formerly-pollutive sites and landscapes into public visions for environmental sustainability. I believe we ought not to question whether this will pose a challenge, rather, we need to begin thinking about how we can prepare for it. Drawing from my discussion throughout this article, I suggest that the rewilding of presently defunct industrial sites and landscapes can serve as useful reference points as we think ahead. On a practical level, trophic and passive rewilding strategies are often highly adaptive, cost-efficient and environmentally sustainable approaches to securing site re-use. Both strategies are implementable across the types of industrial sites that are presently operational in Britain: quarries, mines, factories and larger productive landscapes. Presenting both strategies as sustainable re-use options is key, as each has unique merits that can adapt to case-specific management plans, shifting environmental policies and the socio-cultural values of localised publics. Suggestions for Integrating Rewilding as a Management Strategy If trophic and passive rewilding strategies are to feature as viable options 120 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 for securing environmentally sustainable uses for defunct industrial sites and landscapes, be they in the present or future, I believe that the first step is to enshrine them within public policy and management frameworks. Such a framework might emulate the style of the National Planning Policy Framework (2019), or contribute to Historic England’s ‘Reusing Industrial Sites’ guidance (2023). While I do not claim that rewilding strategies ought to be applied at every industrial site, I believe that they should be equally considered as viable re-use options alongside the more conventional or traditional options, such as residential, business, or other commercial uses. If this is accomplished, I argue that this can encourage those who manage Britain’s industrial heritage and archaeology to integrate trophic and passive rewilding strategies as viable options for site or landscape re-use. Conclusions Throughout this article, I have explored how the rewilding of defunct industrial sites and landscapes presents the opportunity to integrate contentious climate pasts into public calls for environmental sustainability. By drawing from the Castlefield Viaduct Pilot Project, I suggest that trophic rewilding, as a managed process, has the potential to integrate and retain an array of public or public-facing stakeholders within decision-making processes and to create much-needed public greenspaces within urbanised contexts. Through my examination of the Upper Peak Forest Canal, as an example of passive rewilding, I suggest that slower paces of gradual natural reclamation permit local publics to position themselves as future-orientated stakeholders who are invested in the environmental future of the landscape. After exploring the merits of each approach, I then made the case that presently rewilded industrial sites have the potential to act as reference points as we consider the futures of active industries that face the prospect of future termination. Acknowledgements I would like to acknowledge the Economic and Social Research Council’s Doctoral Training Partnership (ESRC DTP) for funding my ongoing PhD Project, which has made the publication of this article possible. I would also November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 121 References Alba Dorado, M.I. (2022). Design of a Transdisciplinary Methodology for the Identification and Characterisation of Industrial Landscapes. Heritage 5(4): 3881–3900. 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Moshenska (ed.) Key Concepts in Public 126 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Archaeology. London: UCL Press, 14–30. UK Government. (2013). Environmental and sustainability policy, GOV.UK. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/environmental-and-sustainability-policy , accessed on 29 August 2023. Wang, L., Pedersen, P.B.M. and Svenning, J.C. (2023). Rewilding abandoned farmland has greater sustainability benefits than afforestation. npj Biodiversity 2(1): 1-4. White, J. (2022). Public Parks and Greenspaces Matter, Historic England. Available at: https://historicengland.org.uk/whats-new/research/back-issues/public-parks-and-greenspaces-matter/ , accessed on 3 February 2023. Wild, C. (2018). Tracks Across the Irwell: From the Liverpool & Manchester Railway to the Ordsall Chord. Industrial Archaeology Review 40(2): 74–87. Wilshaw, J. (2019). History in Action - Rubbing Tiles, Mellor Archaeology. 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Furthermore, the essential necessity to develop free, accessible, and scalable products in the face of the challenges imposed by the current conditions of Brazilian public education teaching programs will be demonstrated. The case studies are based on two digital games Sambaquis – Uma História antes do Brasil, and O Último Banquete em Herculano, developed respectively by the research group Arqueologia Interativa e Simulações Eletrônicas (ARISE) and the Laboratório de Arqueologia Romana Provincial (LARP), both based at the Universidade de São Paulo (Brazil). To conclude, possible reflections on the future of archaeology allied to technological development and its probable applications in education will be addressed. Introduction In recent years, the use of digital technologies in archaeology has become increasingly prominent due to the growing significance of the digital age and the greater accessibility of digital tools. Digital archaeology provides valuable 128 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 means for exploring and interpreting archaeological data through the use of innovative technological approaches. Additionally, digital archaeology has emerged as a powerful tool for outreach and education, as it enables greater public engagement with archaeological data through interactive technologies. Cyber-Archaeology gained popularity among archaeologists following the publication of the BAR International Series volume titled Cyber-Archaeology, edited by the Italian archaeologist Maurizio Forte in 2010 (Forte 2010). Essentially, Cyber-Archaeology is the application of cybernetics concepts and practices, primarily Virtual Reality, analysis and virtual interpretation of archaeological data (Forte 2010; Martire 2017). It is important to note, however, that cyber-archaeological applications do not aim to replicate past phenomena. Instead, they aim to propose interpretative 3D models from archaeological research, which serve as tools capable of facilitating reflection on the complex phenomena of human history. Archaeogaming, on the other hand, is a recent subfield of Digital Archaeology that involves the application of archaeological analysis in and of video games, which encompasses not only the study of video games from a physical perspective (cartridges, consoles, and CDs, among other supports produced for the storage and operation of these games) but also from a digital perspective (games as archaeological sites that can be investigated) (Reinhard 2018). Both Archaeogaming and Cyber-Archaeology are now recognised as critical areas for understanding the relationship between digital games and archaeology, whether these applications are developed for entertainment purposes or as products of academic research at universities or research institutions. Furthermore, these areas highlight the potential of using games as both playful and didactic tools, as applications of this nature can offer complex insights into the past and present through interpretive frameworks that are contextualised and correlated with the use of technology. By adapting and creating innovative approaches to technology, games can serve as potent tools for enhancing knowledge and promoting a deeper understanding of the complexities of the past and present (Arbuckle 2021: 101-109; Boom, 2020: November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 129 27-44; Chapman 2016; Copplestone 2017b; Politopoulos et al. 2019: 163175; Ribeiro and Trindade 2017: 136). Incorporating digital products into elementary and high school classrooms can offer a variety of benefits for both teachers and students. In addition to facilitating a different approach in daily activities, the tools can resonate (Klopfer et al. 2018) with students/teachers and bring them into a new way of thinking about education. Moreover, by providing a product grounded in archaeological research that can be critically analysed, digital applications may enhance the teaching and learning of historical knowledge in schools (Fleming et al. 2017: 73–75; McCall 2011, 2016; Politopoulos et al. 2019: 163-175). According to Champion (2015: 32), digital games serve as an excellent example of the learning potential offered by visualisation tools that are centred on non-textual media, as they have the ability to convey stories and meanings effectively (Arbuckle 2021: 101-109; Boom et al. 2020; McCall 2011,2016; Politopoulos et al. 2019: 163-175). Although digital games are primarily perceived as marketable products, they also have the potential to disseminate knowledge that is shaped and programmed by their developers. They can also be leveraged for educational purposes and thus should be regarded as primary or secondary sources that require critical analysis in scientific research. Within the educational contexts, there are conspicuous examples that illustrate successful models for the integration of digital historical games (Ferdig 2008). This is evidenced by the scholarly contributions of Jeremiah McCall (2011,2016) and the research conducted by Aris Politopoulos and his collaborators (Politopoulos et al. 2019: 163-175). The burgeoning initiative to reform the conventional educational paradigm finds resonance, particularly in its alignment with historical and archaeological subject matter. Furthermore, as a new type of media (Copplestone 2017a: 33), digital games should be evaluated as opinion-forming vehicles that have the potential to shape perspectives. Therefore, it is crucial to explore the possibilities presented by these tools in bringing together the production of scientific knowledge, specifically in interpreting and representing the past and its material culture and interdisciplinary game development practices. 130 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Despite the significant potential of knowledge-sharing applications, their effectiveness in practice depends on various contextual factors, such as the material and socioeconomic conditions of the schools and communities they are intended for. It is important to assess the extent to which these tools can effectively support good teaching practices while remaining free, accessible, and scalable. This paper aims to underscore the need for academic reflection on the production of such applications that uphold the necessary quality standards, even in challenging public education contexts. The following case studies showcase the contextualised use of cyberarchaeological products developed by two research centres at the Universidade de São Paulo. These products were applied in public schools located in the state of São Paulo and other regions of Brazil. Through this presentation, the analysis will focus on the reflections and adaptations resulting from the practical application of these products in schools, highlighting the challenges encountered and strategies employed to address them. O Último Banquete em Herculano (LARP-USP) O Último Banquete em Herculano (The Last Banquet in Herculaneum) is a digital game that represents the first electronic game produced and developed by the Laboratório de Arqueologia Romana Provincial (LARP)1. The game belongs to the adventure genre and utilises point-and-click gameplay. It was created using the Unity graphics engine in conjunction with a plug-in called Adventure Creator to generate the 3D world that the player experiences. The game was officially released in October 2018, with the mobile version being the standout offering, alongside the alternative version for Windows. Although rated for all ages, the game’s target audience is students in the second stage of Elementary School, aged between 10 and 14 years old. LARP is a specialised research laboratory located within the Museu de 1 The computer version of the game is available at: http://www.larp.mae.usp.br/o-ultimo-banquete-em-herculano/download/ November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 131 Arqueologia e Etnologia at the Universidade de São Paulo (MAE-USP). Established in 2011 with the financial support of the Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP), LARP is coordinated by Dr. Maria Isabel D’Agostino Fleming (USP) and co-coordinated by Dr. Vagner Carvalheiro Porto (USP). The laboratory is primarily devoted to investigating the processes of inter-regional interaction between Rome and its provinces with the purpose of formulating reflections on the socio-political and cultural changes in the Italian Peninsula and other regions of the Empire. At the same time, the laboratory’s team is actively engaged in the development of an extensive suite of digital applications and research programs. These initiatives are designed to disseminate the scientific and academic knowledge produced within the museum to a broader, non-specialised audience, with a particular emphasis on reaching the school community2. To illustrate some of its products, some notable examples include3: • Domus VR 2023: an interactive 3D simulation that offers an immersive visit to an ancient Roman house; • Domus AR: an Augmented Reality version of a Roman domus that allows users to visualise and learn about this type of urban residence4; • Interactive Map of the Roman Empire: an application that features textual resources, 3D models of archaeological remains, and a photographic collection mapped visually in each region of the Roman Empire; • Roma Touch: an application that provides a three-dimensional map of Ancient Rome for users to navigate while obtaining information about the 2 It's important to ensure that educational materials and games are aligned with the curriculum standards set by the relevant educational authorities. Adhering to the guidelines outlined in the BNCC (Base Nacional Comum Curricular - National Common Curriculum Base) guarantees that the game meets the educational requirements and objectives expected in Brazilian schools. 3 The interactive 3D applications of LARP can be downloaded for free through the link: http://www.larp.mae.usp.br/rv/ 4 This mobile application is available for smartphones and tablets and represents the first cyber-archaeological project developed for mobile devices (Android) in Brazil. This landmark achievement highlights the LARP’s pioneering and knowledge-sharing mission within the country. 132 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 city’s monuments and buildings. O Último Banquete em Herculano offers players an interactive experience that illustrates the final moments of Herculaneum, a Roman city, before its catastrophic destruction by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE. The game serves as a visually stunning representation of the material culture of ancient Rome, providing an immersive three-dimensional platform that allows players to explore various environments, including the luxurious domus (a wealthy Roman residence), the bustling market, the pottery workshops, the utilitarian warehouse and the sacred area (Fleming and Martire 2019). To ensure maximum accessibility, the developers of O Último Banquete em Herculano opted for a low-poly modelling style for the game’s aesthetic. This choice was motivated by the style’s ability to run smoothly on a wide range of low-cost devices, including smartphones, tablets, and computers with limited processing capabilities. By utilising fewer polygons, the low-poly style does not demand significant processing power, making it easily deployable across different devices. As a result, the game could reach a broader audience, allowing more individuals to engage with the rich cultural history of ancient Rome. To further enhance the educational value of O Último Banquete em Herculano, a Didactic Guide (Gregori and Pina 2018) was released alongside the game. The guide is specifically designed to assist educators in using the game as a tool for didactic learning in the classroom, offering a range of suggested activities based on the game’s scenarios, lesson plans, recommended books and websites about Ancient Rome. Additionally, the guide provides a comprehensive overview of the game’s historically accurate scenarios and their contextualisation, enabling educators to provide their students with a deeper understanding of the material culture of ancient Rome. Following its launch, the game was included as a didactic resource in History curricula planned by the Secretaria da Educação do Estado de São Paulo, which provided an opportunity for LARP to reach a wider audience and fulfil its mission of knowledge-sharing beyond the academic community. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 133 Figure 1: Flyer of O Último Banquete em Herculano launch Source: LARP-MAE-USP. In addition to being implemented in public schools, the use of the game has also been extended to private schools. In terms of the number of downloads and views, these platforms can be very useful to developers. The data from Itch.io, the hosting platform for the computer version of the game, shows that it received 1,560 views and 852 downloads during the five years since its official launch. On the other hand, the version available on Android mobile devices recorded around 2,130 downloads over the same period, according to Google Play analytics. Regrettably, aside from the comments accessible on social networks and the data provided by Google Play, which indicates a total of 80 active devices with the game installed, no additional data was attainable for conducting a comprehensive analysis of the community’s level of engagement with the applications. Sambaquis: uma história antes do Brasil (ARISE-USP) Founded in May 2017, ARISE (Interactive Archaeology and Electronic Simulations) is a research group recognized by the Conselho Nacional de 134 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 2: Screenshot of the game O Último Banquete em Herculano. Source: O Último Banquete em Herculano (LARP-MAE-USP, 2019). Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) Directory of Research Groups in Brazil, also associated with MAE-USP. Led by archaeologists Dr. Alex da Silva Martire (FURG) and Dr. Vagner Carvalheiro Porto (USP), ARISE focuses on the development of research on Digital Humanities, Digital Archaeology, Cyber-Archaeology, and Archaeogaming. The group’s primary objective is to promote the importance of studying and comprehending the potential of digital media, especially digital games, and its practicality in archaeological research to the Brazilian academic community, as well as to stimulate the extroversion of scientific knowledge produced in the academic environment to a non-specialised public. To achieve its mission, ARISE investigates digital material culture presented in interactive electronic media (such as electronic games, serious games, and digital simulations) available in the game industry while also developing interactive applications intended for use in museums, universities, schools, and other educational and November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 135 research institutions5. One of ARISE’s noteworthy applications is the game Sambaquis: uma história antes do Brasil (Sambaquis: A History Before Brazil), designed primarily for students and teachers in Elementary and High School, undergraduates from related fields and individuals with a keen interest in the subject. In collaboration with the Grupo de Pesquisa em Educação Patrimonial e Arqueologia (GRUPEP) from the Universidade do Sul de Santa Catarina (UNISUL) (Santa Catarina, Brazil), the project began in September 2017 and was launched to the public in May 2019. The project was originally conceptualised to be a walking simulator that would showcase the elements of Brazilian coastal ‘sambaquis’.6 However, the ARISE development team decided that transforming the project into an electronic game would make it more appealing to the general public and encourage wider scientific dissemination. The game features missions and dialogues between characters and is set in the past, specifically around 3,000 years ago, in a hypothetical lagoon environment that reflects archaeological, geological, and paleoenvironmental data. To facilitate learning about the daily life and ritual practices of these ancient people, the game’s design allows players to move freely through the territory and interact with characters and objects scattered throughout the landscape. The game’s adventure-style approach also offers an engaging means of exploring academic research topics. To facilitate the use of the game in educational institutions, the ARISE 5 To learn more about ARISE’s projects, access: http://www.arise.mae.usp.br/ 6 The term ‘sambaquis’ originates from the Tupi-Guarani language and refers to a type of shell midden or mound that is prevalent throughout the coastal regions of Brazil and near major bodies of water like dams and rivers. The term translates to ‘heap of shells’, reflecting the mounds’ composition of accumulated shell debris from the indigenous people’s dietary and ritual activities over time. 136 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 group developed complementary products, including: • An Augmented Reality application called Arqueologia R. A. – Grupos pré-coloniais de Santa Catarina (R. A. Archaeology - Pre-colonial groups from Santa Catarina) enables users to visualise and learn about the archaeological artifacts of the ancient inhabitants of the sambaquis. • A didactic guide (Cardoso, Silva and Zamparetti 2019) was created to provide summarised and systematic scientific information about the theme and bring didactic proposals that can be implemented in the classes. • A low-poly version of the original game, entitled SAMBAQUIS – Uma História antes do Brasil (Low-Poly) (Sambaquis: A History Before Brazil (Low-Ploy)), was developed and released in 2021. This version was not only designed for PC like the original game but also for mobile devices (Android) and in WebGL version, making it more accessible to a broader audience. The objective of reaching students and teachers in Brazilian schools, as well as a wider audience interested in the topic, has guided the development stages of the project since its inception. In this sense, both the game and AR application have yielded highly positive results: not only have they been reported in various information channels (TV, websites, social media) as resources being used in several Brazilian schools, but they have also been included as suggestions for interactive media on government organisation websites, such as the Secretaria de Meio Ambiente e Proteção Animal of São Bernardo dos Campos municipality, and as didactic resources in History curricula planned by the Secretaria de Educação of the state of São Paulo and the Secretaria de Educação of the city of São Paulo. Both products have also received highly positive feedback and comments from teachers and other users regarding their use in History classes, as reported on ARISE’s social media platforms (YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and website) and distribution platforms, such as Itch.io and Google Play. As mentioned before, in terms of the number of downloads and views, these platforms can be very useful to developers. The data from Itch.io, the hosting platform for the original version of the game, shows that it received 5,508 views and 1,520 downloads during the four years since its official launch. Similarly, the AR app, exclusively available on Android mobile devices, November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 137 recorded around 2,710 downloads over a period of four years, according to Google Play analytics. Despite the positive results achieved by the original version of the game and the AR application, limitations were identified in terms of access by the public school community. Feedback from users on Google Play analytics, Itch.io, and the Evaluation Form on the ARISE website revealed that many users struggled to run the products effectively due to a shortage of computers in schools and the limited processing capacity of these machines. As most of these devices are low-cost and outdated, it is evident that these limitations are a direct result of the socioeconomic inequality in Brazilian society and the poor material conditions of public schools in the country. To address these limitations and build on the successful experience of O Último Banquete em Herculano from LARP-MAE-USP, a new version of the game was developed with a low-poly aesthetic. This decision was motivated by the need to create a more accessible and inclusive version of the game that would not require high-end hardware to run. The adaptation of the original game to a low-poly version enabled it to be compatible with mobile devices. Although this new version has not been incorporated into the curricula of Education Departments, there has been a noticeable increase in access to the game, as indicated by data from the distribution platforms. According to Itch.io, the low-poly computer version achieved 1,136 views and 757 downloads within two years, while the mobile version garnered 4,510 downloads within the same period and is currently installed on 102 active devices, according to Google Play analytics. The data indicates that the number of downloads for the low-poly computer version has a similar pattern to that of the original game, whereas the mobile version has seen a substantial increase in downloads in just two years since its release. This observation underscores the importance of making applications available on various platforms and devices and highlights the potential of low-poly techniques for producing applications that require more basic technical and material resources. 138 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 3: Cover of the game Sambaquis: uma história antes do Brasil. Source: ARISE-MAEUSP, 2019. The Potential for Scientific Communication The case studies presented in this paper employed a low-poly modelling technique, which involves creating stylised models using a minimal number of polygons. This technique is designed to produce a final product that can run on low-cost equipment, including smartphones, tablets, and computers with limited processing power. The reduced computational demand also enables the development of multiple game formats. Specifically, the mobile and browser-based (excluding the need for download, installation, and hard drive memory consumption) versions widened access to the games, particularly in school and home environments where a significant portion of the population may lack access to personal computers. The concern about public access to these digital educational resources in Brazil is based on an analysis of the country’s education system, encompassing both public and private sectors, and their relationship with the socio-economic November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 139 Figure 4: Screenshot of the game Sambaquis: uma história antes do Brasil (Low-Poly). Source: Sambaquis: uma história antes do Brasil (Low-Poly) (ARISE-MAE-USP, 2021). context. According to the 2021 Basic Education Census7, the most recent governmental statistical survey, published by INEP (Instituto Nacional de Estudos e Pesquisas Educacionais Anísio Teixeira) in collaboration with state and municipal education authorities, as well as Brazilian public and private schools, a substantial majority of students, specifically 81.4%, are enrolled in public educational institutions, with the remaining 18.6% being part of the private education system. Complementing this assessment, the INSE (Indicador de Nível Socioeconômico) survey8, published in 2021 by SAEB (Sistema Nacional 7 Available at: https://www.gov.br/inep/pt-br/centrais-de-conteudo/acervo-linha-editorial/ publicacoes-institucionais/estatisticas-e-indicadores-educacionais/resumo-tecnico-do-censo-da-educacao-basica-2020 8 Available at: https://www.gov.br/inep/pt-br/acesso-a-informacao/dados-abertos/indicadores-educacionais/nivel-socioeconomico 140 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 de Avaliação da Educação Básica), scrutinised the socioeconomic status of students in Brazilian basic education. This assessment classified students into eight distinct levels, denoted as I through VIII, where the former designates students whose parents possess minimal educational qualifications and endure precarious material conditions, including the absence of essential household amenities like refrigerators, washing machines, computers, etc., while the latter characterises students whose parents have attained higher education degrees and enjoy affluent material conditions. This investigation discerned that 28.6% of students fell within levels I to III, 55.2% occupied levels IV to VI, and only 16.2% were situated within levels VII to VIII. In the specific context of the state of São Paulo, which has integrated both digital games into its educational curriculum, the proportion of students regularly enrolled in the public educational system stands at a slightly lower figure of 76.2%, still overshadowing the 23.8% of students in the private sector. Regrettably, the INSE technical document does not provide a granular breakdown based on the total student enrollment but rather presents a general average that positions schools within the state at level V in terms of INSE’s socioeconomic status. Thus, the expansion of accessibility to these digital products serves as a paramount strategy aimed at fostering enhanced social equity. By prioritising the integration of these educational games not only within private institutions but also within public schools, we extend access to students hailing from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds. According to the TIC Educação 2019 survey9, which was conducted by Cetic.br (Centro Regional de Estudos para o Desenvolvimento da Sociedade da Informação), and published in June 2020, it was found that only 40% of public school students possess access to personal computers or tablets at their homes. Moreover, 21% of public school students access the internet only through mobile phones. 9 Available at: https://cetic.br/pt/pesquisa/educacao/analises/ November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 141 Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, virtual learning environments or platforms were available in only 14% of public schools, including both state and municipal schools with free study programs. On the other hand, the data released by IBGE (Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística) in 202210 reveal that merely 10% of public-school students lack access to the internet, and 97.6% of them rely on their mobile phones as their primary device for internet access. Furthermore, the study shows that 82.2% of children aged 10 to 13 use their cell phones regularly. The case studies of O Último Banquete em Herculano and Sambaquis – uma história antes do Brasil (Low-Poly) serve as exemplars of the advantages of using low-poly games to address some of the constraints that may arise during the implementation of these products in both school and home environments, particularly when considering the material and socio-economic circumstances of the target audience. It is evident that the utilisation of the low-poly style constitutes just one among several strategies for optimising educational games and, as a consequence, broadening the accessibility of these products within the school community. Developers must ensure that the final product minimises resource wastage, compresses animations, meshes, graphic textures, and manages heavy audio assets. Employing fast low-level programming languages like C++ and achieving a harmonious balance in rendering processes is indispensable. Furthermore, developers should deploy performance profilers to pinpoint areas within their code that exhibit suboptimal performance. Nonetheless, it is imperative to acknowledge that when adopting the low-poly style, certain visual and graphical elements commonly found in other types of applications, such as the intricate level of detail characteristic of photorealistic applications and games created through methods like 10 Available at: https://agenciadenoticias.ibge.gov.br/agencia-noticias/2012-agencia-de-noticias/noticias/34954-internet-ja-e-acessivel-em-90-0-dos-domicilios-do-pais-em-2021 142 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 photogrammetry or various scanning techniques, must be sacrificed. Models made in the low-poly style often assume a more blocky or jagged appearance. Hence, the adoption of the low-poly style may pose challenges in accurately representing the nuanced features of material culture should be cautiously limited to contexts where sacrificing a higher level of detail does not significantly hinder the generation of valuable knowledge. Nevertheless, it is noteworthy that even within the constraints of low-poly aesthetics, these models still facilitate a comprehensive exploration of the multifaceted facets of past societies. In the realm of game design, it is widely accepted that games should not be constrained to be dull or ‘serious’. Instead, games should strive to be resonant with their players, engaging and captivating them both intellectually and emotionally (Klopfer et al. 2018). Ultimately, the primary purpose of a game is to entertain, and it is only through an enjoyable and stimulating gameplay experience that educational goals can be effectively achieved. Therefore, game designers must prioritise the creation of engaging and entertaining gameplay above all else, recognising that it is this foundational element that enables the educational component to flourish organically. By effectively combining educational content with engaging gameplay, games can become powerful tools for learning and can foster critical thinking, problem-solving, and other important skills in players. As previously mentioned, public universities have a critical role to play in developing accessible, scalable, and usable products that serve the public good by promoting scientific advancement and disseminating knowledge to those who need it most. Final Reflections This paper emphasises the significance of archaeogaming tools as an effective means of disseminating knowledge about archaeology and cultural heritage. In particular, the focus is on public schools in Brazil, where there is a pressing need for accessible, scalable, and usable products that can be easily adopted by students. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 143 It showcases two case studies that illustrate the effectiveness of unconventional approaches to learning, specifically through video games. Low-poly modelling was chosen as the design aesthetic for both games, as it provides an alternative design tool that overcomes limitations in educational and domestic environments’ material conditions. The main objective of these case studies was to explore the potential of video games as a tool in the classroom, proposed by teachers from both public and private institutions. Educational and research institutions can leverage technology to provide engaging and effective learning experiences by creating and using accessible, scalable, and usable products. One way to achieve this is through the use of resonant games, which are designed to be enjoyable and captivating to players, fostering emotional and intellectual connections with them. Resonant games need to be fun, as well as the act of learning. The potential of these technologies is clear. Improving accessibility and inclusivity in archaeology and enabling more people to engage with and learn from the discipline are key goals for the future of education. By exploring the opportunities and challenges presented by these two case studies, we aim to contribute to ongoing discussions about the role of archaeology and technology in shaping our understanding of the past and preparing future generations for the challenges of tomorrow. 144 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 References Arbuckle C. M. 2021. Undergraduate Teaching and Assassin’s Creed: Discussing Archaeology with Digital Games. Advances in Archaeological Practice. 9(2):101-109. Boom, K.H.J.; Ariese C.E.; Hout, B.; Mol A.A.A.; Politopoulos, A. 2020. Teaching through Play: Using Video Games as a Platform to Teach about the Past. In Communicating the Past in the Digital Age: Proceedings of the International Conference on Digital Methods in Teaching and Learning in Archaeology (12–13 October 2018), edited by Sebastian Hageneuer, pp. 27–44. Ubiquity Press, London. Cardoso, J.M., Silva, R.E., and Zamparetti, B.C. 2019. Sambaquis: uma história antes do Brasil: guia didático. São Paulo: MAE/USP. Champion, E. 2015. Critical gaming: interactive history and virtual heritage. Surrey: Ashgate. Chapman, A. 2016. Digital Games as History: How Videogames Represent the Past and Offer Access to Historical Practice. Routledge, New York. Copplestone, T. 2017a. Adventures in Archaeological Game Creation. SAA Magazine 17(2): 33–39. Copplestone, T.J. 2017b. Designing and developing a playful past in video games. In: Mol, AAA, et al. (eds.), The interactive past: Archaeology, heritage, and video games, 85–97. Leiden: Sidestone Press. Ferdig, RE. 2008. The handbook of research on effective electronic gaming in education. Pennsylvania: IGI Global. Fleming, M.I.D., Abreu, T.B.A., Bastos, M.T., Martire, A.S. and Gregori, A.M. 2017. A importância das novas tecnologias para a arqueologia e suas possibilidades de uso. A Impressão 3D e os projetos do LARP. Vestígios 11(1): 57–79. Fleming, M.I.D. and Martire, A.S. (orgs). 2019. Humanidades digitais e arqueologia: o desenvolvimento de o último banquete em herculano. São Paulo: MAE/USP. Forte, M. 2010. Introduction to Cyber-Archaeology. In Forte, M. (ed) Cyber-Archaeology. Oxford: Archaeopress, BAR, v. 2177, 9–13. Gregori, A. and Pina, A. 2018. Guia Didático: o último banquete em Herculano. São Paulo: MAE/USP. McCall, J. 2016. Teaching History with Digital Historical Games: An Introduction to the Field and Best Practices. Simulation & Gaming 47:517–542. McCall, J. 2011. Gaming the past: Using video games to teach secondary history. London and New York: Routledge. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 145 Klopfer, E., Haas, J., Osterweil, S. and Rosenheck, L. 2018. Resonant Games: Design Principles for Learning Games that Connect Hearts, Minds, and the Everyday. MIT Press. Martire, A.S. 2017. Ciberarqueologia em Vipasca: o uso de tecnologias para a reconstrução-simulação interativa arqueológica. Unpublished PhD thesis submitted to the University of São Paulo. Reinhard, A. 2018. Archaeogaming: An Introduction to Archaeology in and of Video Games. New York: Berghahn Books. Ribeiro, A.I. and Trindade, S.D. 2017. O ensino da História e tecnologias – conexões, possibilidades e desafios no espaço das Humanidades Digitais. In Porto, C. and Moreira, J.A. (orgs). Educação no ciberespaço. Novas configurações, convergências e conexões. Aracajú/Santo Tirso: Editora Universitária Tiradentes/Editora WhiteBooks, 145–159. Politopoulos, A., Ariese C.E., Boom, K.H.J, Mol A.A.A. 2019. Romans and Rollercoasters: Scholarship in the Digital Playground. Journal of Computer Applications in Archaeology 2:163– 175. 146 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Stonehenge in Punch Cartoons 1860-1999: A Leaky Pipeline from Experts to the Public Greg Michaelson Department of Archaeology, School of Geosciences, University of Aberdeen [email protected] Abstract Popular accounts of prehistory usually reflect prevailing archaeological understanding. However, cartoons about prehistory are based on a small number of well-established tropes, that seem resistant to new evidence and changing interpretations. In an ongoing study, over 850 cartoons about prehistory, published in Punch between 1841 and 2002, are being interrogated. Of these, 96 concern Stonehenge, an internationally renowned monument, whose origins, purposes, and symbolic status are regularly contested. From expert publication, public dissemination, and educational and popular accounts, it might be expected that Stonehenge cartoons would expose Druid, Bronze Age or Neolithic origins, astronomical, mortuary, religious or ritual use, and wider British exceptionalism. However, while timelessness is a pervasive theme, origins and use are jumbled, and explicit nationalism is rare. Rather, the cartoons offer multiple readings, reflecting recurrent concerns and whims. The cartoons suggest a longstanding disjunction between humour about Stonehenge, and expert debates. This offers opportunities for informed, yet entertaining, interventions. Introduction Stonehenge is one of the few monuments that truly deserve the sobriquet ‘iconic’. Internationally recognised as of central significance for the Western European transition from Neolithic to Bronze cultures, Stonehenge has been the subject of vast numbers of scientific and popular accounts, over many decades. Visiting Stonehenge has steadily grown in popularity since it was November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 147 acquired for the state in 1918, and there have long been far more visitors than its facilities can cope with. However, the monument’s wider status rests on interpretations in popular media like magazine articles, mass market books and television programs. How, then, might public understanding of Stonehenge be assessed? And how might that understanding have changed, as archaeological interpretations have changed? In the absence of longitudinal studies, one approach is to seek proxies, and cartoons are a promising candidate. As Geipel (1972) observes, “cartoons represent a priceless primary source of information about the fleeting modes and mores of the passing generations’’, offering insights into the “’unofficial attitudes and reactions of ordinary folk” (p10). That is, for cartoons to work, they must reflect their audiences’ conceptions. Cartoons are humorous drawings, often augmented with text, whose effects depend on dissonances amongst their elements. They are intended to be glanced at, not pondered over, which requires the rapid recognition of elemental tropes, of which readers must have some prior understanding (Gombrich 1963, Geipel 1972, Hewison 1977). Thus, if such tropes can be identified, their origins worked out, and their changes traced, this may give insights into prior and changing reader understandings. In the later 20th century, several archaeologists observed that cartoons catch the zeitgeist. (Bray 1973, Bray 1981, Daniel 1992a, Gamble 1992, Sillar 1992a&b). Based on very small numbers of cartoons, they suggested that there was a disconnect between archaeology and public understanding, and that cartoons deserved further investigation. This study offers a way to explore this for the case of Stonehenge. From experts to the public Figure 1 shows the model of the pipeline from expert interpretation to cartoon readers that underpins this study. From the bottom up, prehistoric people make material culture which is interpreted by experts. An expert is usually an academic or a professional practitioner, whose expertise is peer 148 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 1. Flow of interpretations from experts to laypeople acknowledged. So, an interpretation is usually within an academic domain, as a scholarly or technical book, paper, report or presentation, typically peer reviewed. Popularisers then make popularisations of interpretations, that is presentations of interpreted material for a wider, lay audience. These are nontechnical, principally in textual, broadcast and on-line media, and museum and site displays and exhibitions. A populariser is not necessarily expert, though experts may be popularisers. In particular, an artist is a populariser, and a cartoon is a popularisation, informed principally, though not entirely, by other popularisations. These are separated out here, because the central foci of this study are the contexts for the creation of cartoons, and for lay people seeing them. This apparent one-way flow is patently a simplification. In particular, as Moser (2003) notes, knowledge is a dynamic social construction “created November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 149 through an interaction between scholarly discourse and popular culture” (p4). Furthermore, an individual may embody multiple actor roles at the same time, for example where an expert produces popularisations. As Moser (2003) further observes, experts were once lay people, and were influenced by popularisations as children, and as students (p4). And a source of information may have multiple functions. Thus, Galanidou (2008) refers to texts that “sit uncomfortably on the fence between archaeology and education” (p182). Nonetheless, this model provides an organising principle. Punch as a source In a wider exploration of cartoon presentations of prehistory, broadly conceived of as covering the Palaeolithic to the Early Medieval periods, over 850 cartoons were collected by exhaustive inspection of over 300 volumes of Punch covering 1841 to 2002. While cartoons about “cavemen” predominate, 96 cartoons depict, or mention, a megalith. These form the cohort for this study. Punch, or the London Charivari, was a British humorous magazine that appeared weekly from 1841 to 1992, and then from 1996 to 2002. It was distinguished by a high cartoon content; indeed, the term ‘cartoon’ originated with Punch. While initially radical, Punch quickly became an influential establishment voice, fondly, if irreverently, promoting British imperialism and colonialism, and reactionary views of gender, ethnicity and class. Spielmann (1895) is a canonical account from 1841 to 1894. Price (1957) extends the history to 1957. Prager (1979) continues to 1979. Punch is a valuable source as its extent covers the emergence of modern archaeology from antiquarianism, through the New Archaeology, to the start of Post-Processualism (Trigger 2006). In so far as cartoons about Stonehenge reflect contemporary archaeological thinking, this should show up in Punch. Further, Punch sustained a wide if fluctuating circulation: from 40,000 in 1850 to 200,000 in the early 1950s, declining to 82,000 in 1979 (Orme 1985a, 1985b). Orme (1985b) notes that Punch’s readership far outstripped its sales (p36). Thus, substantial numbers of people will have seen Punch’s 150 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Stonehenge cartoons Approach The Stonehenge cartoons were classified using categories derived from the literature, explored below, to identify their components. The semiotic practice (Williamson 1978), of distinguishing denotations and connotations is followed. Loseke (2013) terms these manifest and latent content (p92). Denotations concern what images portray. To locate them, the “narrative structure” of each cartoon is analysed, interrogating how their components interact (Eco 1981). The close analysis in Rossholm (2016), of late Victorian Swedish cartoons about gendered bourgeois behaviour, offers an excellent model. Connotations concern what the cartoons may imply to a contemporary reader, beyond their immediate elements. Gombrich (1963) notes that it is difficult to appreciate old cartoons, because analogies that were once topical are no longer understood; allusions in images depend on how much the artist and audience share “a common stock of knowledge” (p133). Thus successful cartoons depend on how the artist combines “the topical and the permanent, the passing allusion and the lasting characterisation.” (p138). Finally, aspects of gender, ethnicity and class will also determine a cartoon’s different readings (Berger 1972). Typology The starting point is that humour about Stonehenge will more or less follow contemporary, that is period, understandings, noting that, for all the twists and turns, there is close agreement between late Victorian and early 21st century interpretations. Flinders Petrie (1880), in Stonehenge. Plans, Description, and Theories, set out four theories about its purpose: “(1) Sepulchral, (2) Memorial, (3) Religious, or (4) Astronomical; or combinations of some or all of these.” (p31). And Travis Elborough (2016), in discussing the 1929 concrete Stonehenge simulacra in Washington State, says that “current November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 151 thinking variously fingers the landmark as a burial place, a lunar temple, an astronomical clock, a place of healing and, most improbably of all, as a landing pad for UFOs.” (p83). There has been a strong popular association of Stonehenge with the Druids since William Stukely (1760), which was reinvigorated by the early 19th century reinvention of the Order (Piggot 1968). This is augmented by late 20th century New Age beliefs (J. and C. Bord 1974). Both are reinforced by annual mass media coverage of midsummer celebrations at Stonehenge. Similarly, astronomical interpretations were given new impetus in the 1960s, following the work of Gerald Hawkins (Hawkins and White 1965) and Alexander Thom (1967). Indeed, Jacquetta Hawkes’ (1967) much cited “Every age has the Stonehenge it deserves - or desires.” (p174) is from her rebuttal. Finally, Barclay and Brophy (2022) have suggested that British nationalism has been a major component of archaeological narratives about Stonehenge. These, then, are all aspects of archaeological interpretations that might be found in cartoons about Stonehenge, depending on which theory or theories are in the public ascendancy in any period. A key question concerns the relationship between representations of the past and experiences of the present. Do things change through time, or do they remain much the same? Is there some notion of teleological progress, from prehistory to contemporary society? Thus, will there be othering, where, for example, earlier people have restricted competences compared with contemporary people, or are competences unchanging? In particular, how are the people in the cartoons, ‘them’, related to the people reading the cartoons, ‘us’. Are ‘we’ invited to laugh at or sympathise with ‘them’, or indeed both? Are ‘they’ depicted as being like ‘us’, or are ‘they’ very different, that is like ‘themselves’ and other than ‘us’? If ‘they’ are like ‘us’, is that because ‘they’ have our sensibilities, despite living in the past, or are ‘they’ actually ‘us’ projected into that past? Or are ‘they’ simply ‘us’? 152 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Throughout this period, there are gross imbalances in favour of men in illustration of prehistory, as Moser (1993), Gifford Gonzalez (1993), Solometo and Moss (2013) and Galinadou (2007) all identified. Comparable gender representations in cartoons might be expected. Finally, cartoons may be ‘Whacky’, where the humour depends on improbable juxtapositions. A longstanding prehistoric example is the presence of humans and dinosaurs in the same period. Prehistoric people with future knowledge or understanding, or deploying future technology, also come into this category. This is related to the broader ‘zany’ or ‘crazy’ cartoon humour, where the cartoon follows its own logic but remains grounded in reality (Hewison 1977) (p45). In summary, the typology used here has 9 categories, based on these criteria, and firmed up by a first pass through the cartoons: • Context – is the megalith Relevant or Incidental? • Megalith – is the depicted megalith a Dolmen, a Single stone, Stonehenge or some other arrangement of Stones? • Type – is the cartoon Them Like Us (TLU), Us Like Them (ULT), Them Like Them (TLT), Us Like Us (ULU), Nothing Changes (NC) or Whacky? • Time – is the cartoon set in Deep Time, Biblical time, Lithics use time, Druid time or Roman time, or is it Contemporary? • People – does the cartoon depict Children, Male, Female, Druids or Roman people, or a Crowd? • Speaking – which people are speaking, and to who? • Builder – if the cartoon shows the megalith being constructed, is it by Aliens, Ancient Britons, Druids or Lithics using peoples? • Topic – what is the cartoon about? • Use – what use of the megalith is depicted? Note that boundaries between Topic and Use are flexible. The intention is to gain an overall feel for how the sense of cartoons changes. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 153 Despite the longstanding deployment of problematic ethnic analogies, which often served to distance prehistoric peoples as primitive, characters in all cartoons appear to be undifferentiated European. Only a small number of cartoons refer to class, and then indirectly. Few cartoons reflect any overt sense of Britishness. Image coding and processing The cartoons were hand coded by identifying visual and textual aspects that reflected the above typology. Each cartoon embodies multiple categories. Key considerations were: when and where the cartoon was set (Context, Megalith, Time); what the characters looked like (People), what they were doing (Construction, Use, Topic), and how they interacted (Speaking, Topic); and the relationship between cartoon characters and audience (Type). Coding was organised using NVivo 12 Pro under Windows 10 Home, to generate .xlsx reports, associating images and code. NVivo does not adequately support time sequence analysis, so, to generate code occurrences by year and period, the reports were processed as .csv files by a C program, running under Ubuntu on Windows 10 Home, written by the author. Excel was then used to structure the .csv file this program generated, to produce Figures 2 and 10. Cartoon characterisation Figure 2 shows the distribution of occurrences of the 96 cartoons found between 1860 and 1999. The apparent increase may be because Punch steadily grew in size. It would be disingenuous to discuss cartoons spanning 140 years as if they were a single cohort. Readers who saw earlier cartoons will not have seen any markedly later ones. Later artists may well have seen the work of their predecessors, but later readers are unlikely to have seen markedly earlier cartoons. With these in mind, cartoons are placed in their historical contexts of publication, drawing on contemporary popular accounts of cartoon subjects. 154 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 2. Occurrences of Stonehenge cartoon by year Given relatively low numbers of cartoons across the timespan, for conciseness, cartoon characteristics are presented in periods of twenty years. It is fortuitous that the boundaries align well with major events like the two World Wars, and with changes in interpretations of Stonehenge, as well as wider archaeology. It is worth considering overall trends where there are substantive differences between occurrences of characteristics, so some whole cohort characteristics are also presented. To illustrate coding, one cartoon from each period is discussed, exemplifying the interplay of different categories. Cartoons are cited as [artist year.volume. page] and [artist year.volume.month.day.page] after 1983, reflecting changes in Punch indexing practice. It is salutary to note that analysing cartoons loses what little humour they may hold for a casual reader. Figure 3 [Moyr Smith 1878.74.70] from 1878 is the first in a panel of 12 vignettes depicting The History of British Courtship: From the Earliest Period To The Present Time. Each shows a couple in stereotypical period dress, in one of the supposed stages of courtship, culminating in a Victorian marriage. Stonehenge is incidental to the Ancient Briton context, which combines the types Them Like Us and Nothing Changes. Topics are gender as well as courtship, driven by the myth of how a man woos a woman. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 155 Figure 3. 1. Early British. Admiration. J. Moyr Smith, Punch, 1874, Volume 74, p.70. The tattooed man, with a severed head tastefully covering his genitals, is very like John White’s 1585 depiction of a Pictish Man (Moser 1998 Plate 7). In contrast, the woman is wearing what could be a contemporary fabric skirt, with a large bow at the back. While Stonehenge is a minor element, it connotes Britishness, which in turn is signified by the titles for the individual vignette and overall panel. Figure 4 [Reed 1894.107.34] from 1894 shows one of Edward Tennyson Reed’s Prehistoric Peeps (Reed 1896), long acknowledged as a pioneering series about prehistory (Horrall 2017). Here, Stonehenge is relevant, with a trilithon forming a gargantuan stumps and bail for the cricket match. This, like most of Reed’s Peeps, is Us Like Them, with contemporary people conducting contemporary activities projected back into the past. The cartoon is also Whacky, with the improbable cricket match disrupted by a genial plesiosaur. Here the use is leisure. The people are Reed’s classic cavemen, that is Europeans wearing furs and wielding stone and wooden tools. The cartoon may reference international cricket tours of 1893 and 1894. It includes caricatures of well known cricketers, for example W. G. Grace. As in 156 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 4. Prehistoric Peeps. A Cricket Match. “How’s That, Umpire!” E. T. Reed, Punch, 1894, Volume 107, p.34. many Peeps, women are absent. The combination of Stonehenge and cricket connote Britishness. Figure 5 [Morrow 1919.156.481B] from 1919 is one of a Nothing Changes sequence of Scenes From Our Great Film: “Audacity Down The Ages”. Stonehenge, here a curve of trilithons, is incidental to this Roman time jest. The cartoon, populated by Them Like Us Druids and a Roman man, is further Whacky, as the safety razor was not invented until the 18th century, and one druid has his beard in a trolley. Nonetheless, travelling pedlars will have been commonplace for contemporary readers, as well as in a Roman context. Figure 6 [Beauchamp 1932.183.447] from 1932 is a contemporary cartoon. Here Stonehenge is relevant to the barbed conversation that puns the ages of the monument and the woman posing on the sarsen, driven by November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 157 Figure 5. Roman Commercial Traveller Trying To Sell Safety Razors To The Druids. G. Morrow, Punch, 1919, Volume 156, p.481. Under licence from Topham Partners LLP. stereotyped female rivalry. This Us Like Us cartoon is about social class as well as gender, visually mocking the parvenu visitors. Figure 7 [Morrow 1946.210.466] from 1946 is a complex cartoon. At first glance, a relevant Stonehenge is portrayed in Roman time. Here, Them Like Us soldiers discuss the monument’s use for leisure, through a Whacky reference to cricket: five stones form stumps and bails, recapitulating Reed’s cartoon in Figure 1. The pedlar selling souvenirs recapitulates Morrow’s earlier cartoon in Figure 5. However, this cartoon also inverts a much older tradition of showing naïve or ignorant British tourists visiting Roman remains. Furthermore, the cartoon appeared a year after the end of World War Two, when British occupation troops in Italy may have wondered at Roman monuments, just as 158 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 6. He. “That’s prehistoric, that is.” She. “Looks even older than that to me.” K. Beauchamp, Punch, 1932, Volume 183, p. 447. Under licence from Topham Partners LLP. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 159 Figure 7. “Temple my foot! It’s some kind of native game.” G. Morrow, Punch, 1946, Volume 210, p. 466. Under licence from Topham Partners LLP. Figure 8. “Quick! Dismantle it! Romans are coming!” W. Miller, Punch, 1965, Volume 249, p. 387. Under licence from Topham Partners LLP. 160 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Roman occupation troops may have wondered at British monuments 2000 years earlier. Perhaps this irony of the conquerors conquered also connotes something about shared humanity across time and nation. The cartoon in Figure 8 [Miller 1965.249.387] from 1965 is also complex. Stonehenge is relevant to this Roman period jest, showing its Whacky use for Them Like Us leisure: the people, who might well be Druids, are clearly enjoying themselves, just as contemporary folk might. The steam train, a 19th century stereotype, is referencing contemporary international interest in monorails as a potential form of urban transport, with a widely publicised system installed in Seattle for the 1962 Century 21 Exposition (Seattle Centre Monorail 2022). However, the alarm at the approaching Romans may also connote Cold War fears of regional blocs acquiring each other’s technologies, as, for example the USA removed advanced equipment, along with experts, from a shattered Germany after World War Two (Gimbel 1990). Note that the cartoon predates the later 1960s New Age theories that the ancients had advanced technologies now lost to us. Finally, the stripped back Them Like Us cartoon in Figure 9 [Hobart 1984.287.8.22.15], from 1984, shows lithic time, male megalith builders. While a relevant Stonehenge is not directly depicted, it is denoted by the sarsen on the rollers. The puzzlement about what constitutes a henge connotes a wider lack of knowledge of why the monument was constructed, reflected in several other cartoons about contemporary visits. Cohort analysis Trends between 1860 and 1999, in twenty year groups, are considered next. Figure 10 shows summary graphs of occurrences of cartoons by individual categories. It is not feasible here to present occurrences of combined categories. These are alluded to when significant. Topics and uses with less than three occurrences have been amalgamated as Other. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 161 All the cartoons depict megaliths. In 18, the megalith is incidental, establishing the context for the rest of the cartoon. 86 cartoons show Stonehenge itself, and it is relevant in most of these. Overall, most cartoons are set in a contemporary period (45), with the proportion increasing towards the present. 16 cartoons are set in Lithic time and 14 in Druid time. Most of these appeared between 1960 and 1999. The cartoon type is particularly interesting. Only 10 cartoons depict othering of past peoples (TLT), with six appearing between 1960 and 1999. In contrast, 41 cartoons set in the past depict people behaving as contemporary folk might (TLU), whereas only two cartoons show contemporary people projected into the past (ULT). As a plurality of cartoons are contemporary (45), it is not surprising that 37 show contemporary people being themselves (ULU). Six cartoons are about the timelessness of human experience (NC). Overall, the cartoons are about contemporary concerns, explored in both the past and present. Only 25 cartoons are Whacky, with most occurrences between 1960 and 1999. This may reflect Punch editorial policy. In contrast, The New Yorker, which started publishing in 1925 and was aimed at a comparable readership, had predominantly ‘crazy’ cartoons (Price 1957) (p237). Men (79) appear far more frequently than women (31), with the exception of the period from 1920 to 1939 when occurrences approach parity. Given the overall disparity, it is not surprising that men speak most frequently to other men (34). When women and men appear together, men speak more frequently to women (12) than women to men (9), and women speak rarely to other women (2). There is a little variation in the balance of speaking across the timeline. The poor representation of women, and their relative passivity, corresponds to the disparities in wider illustrations of prehistory noted above. Druids (19) appear more often than lithics using people (16), with most such cartoons appearing between 1960 and 1999. Similarly, Druids (8) are 162 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 9. “What exactly is a ‘henge’, anyway?” N. Hobart (Nick), Punch, 1984, Volume 287, 22nd August, p. 15. Under licence from Topham Partners LLP. shown slightly more often in the building of Stonehenge than lithics using people (7), again with most appearing between 1960 and 1999. Druids are typically shown designing or using Stonehenge, and lithics folk hefting stones, giving a class connotation. It is notable how long the association with prehistoric, as opposed to modern, Druids persisted, despite their progressive repudiation in mainstream archaeology (Piggott 1968). The lithic time construction of Stonehenge commonly depicts sarsens being moved on rollers, and manipulated from ramps into foundation pits using levers and ropes. This is strongly in accord with illustrations of the construction of Stonehenge in educational literature, from at least 1920 onwards, for example (Quinnell and Quinnell 1922, Airne 1932, Davies and Steel 1937). Perhaps 1960 to 1999 artists had seen such books when younger. The most frequently occurring topics are the circumstances of megalith construction (8), gender (6), impact on the environment (4), ownership (4) and purpose (4), often by visitors, with doubt, or unlikely theories, being raised. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 163 Figure 10. Occurrences of codes by 20 year period. The most frequently occurring use is for visiting (20), with peaks in 1920 to 1939 and 1960 to 1979, which both saw increasing post-war mobility and leisure time. There are only 11 occurrences of religious use, mostly after 1920, and four of astronomical use, all after 1940, which is striking given their central roles in archaeological discourses about Stonehenge. In contrast, there are 11 occurrences of leisure use and five of military use, the latter corresponding to late Victorian manoeuvres on Salisbury Plain, and the Second World War. There are few cartoons about modern Druids after 1879, and none showing later 20th century New Age use, despite the growing controversies over the Stonehenge Festival, which began in 1974 (Fowler 1990). This may again reflect Punch editorial policy: Bender (1998) includes a number of newspaper cartoons concerning contested access and state suppression of travellers. Similarly, while there was a later 20th century fad for ancient extraterrestrial interventions in prehistory (Von Daniken 1968), aliens only appear once. Conclusion Analysis of Stonehenge cartoons has failed to identify any persistent underlying archaeological tropes, beyond its prehistoric construction and association with Druids, and maleness. Overall, the cartoons suggest a genuine lack of understanding of Stonehenge, at least by the cartoonists, and, by implication, their audiences. Perhaps Stonehenge serves to represent an undifferentiated prehistory. The findings confirm the intuitions of the archaeologists mentioned above, that cartoons demonstrate a disconnect between interpretations and public understanding, at least for these cartoons. Several also expressed pessimism about realigning cartoon representations with interpretations. Bray (1981) distinguished “archaeology as perceived by archaeologists, and archaeology as perceived by the man in the street.” (p221). He claimed that “there are no new jokes” and “certain long term trends stand out”, suggesting a ”progressive trivialisation of archaeology”(p222) represented by a mythic ‘Archaeologyland’ (p224). Sillar (1992b) also thought that cartoons have 164 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 not changed with the archaeology. Particularly pertinent, Daniel (1992b) observed that “it is clear that Stonehenge and megalithic architecture are now so much a part of the general public’s awareness of the prehistoric past that any joke will pass” (p63). However, as Moshenska (2017) comments: “The reality of popular culture archaeology is more complicated than Bray [(1981)] suggests” (p152). As the above analysis indicates, the cartoons do not only project current concerns into the past, as Bray (1981) and Sillar (1992b) presume. Cartoons offer multiple if interconnected readings. Cartoons may serve as an intervention as well as a record. Clark (2009) observes that cartoons both ‘’respond to, and can shape, public understandings of science in important ways’’ (p573). Sillar’s suggestion (1992b) that archaeologists should deploy cartoons to “make people reconsider their ideas about the past” (p208) deserves further exploration. There have been fruitful collaborations between archaeologists and cartoonists. Thus, Bill Tidy lampooned a wide range of archaeological concerns, but as text illustrations, for example (Bahn 1996, Bahn and Tidy 1999), or for informed audiences, for example in British Archaeology (Pitts 2023). There is a current impetus for archaeologists and artists to work together in making comics to promote archaeological ideas more widely (Kamash et al 2022). Perhaps new collaborations might produce pithy Stonehenge cartoons aimed at generalist audiences. The study in McDowall (2023), which is contrasted with that in Wood and Cotton (1999), suggests that public understanding of prehistory is evolving beyond cavemen and dinosaurs. However, establishing new tropes requires considerable public traction. The problem with Stonehenge is precisely its iconic status, which occludes its situated and cultural contexts. Further, Reed’s longstanding tropes underpin ongoing humorous representations of prehistory as impoverished. Comprehensive major exhibitions like Symbols Of Power At The Time Of Stonehenge (Clarke et al 1985) and The World Of Stonehenge (Garrow and Wilkin 2022) are vital for presenting contemporary November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 165 interpretations, but these are very infrequent and of restricted reach. In the meantime, annual live reporting of the midsummer sunrise further reproduces Stonehenge’s mysterious centrality. Punch humour was originally predicated on puns, and Stonehenge offers considerable scope for concocting new ones. How might browsers, rather than archaeologists, come to recognise the archer who gets lost at Avebury, the cursus seekers at the circus, or the guitarist in search of blues tones? Cartoons are a specialised form of popularisation, and on their own can have little impact. They should be deployed as part of a multi-faceted popularisation of the wider Neolithic/Bronze Age context for Stonehenge, emphasising the richness and diversity of everyday culture, alongside ongoing evaluation of public understanding. Acknowledgements Cartoons [Morrow 1919.156.481B, Beauchamp 1932.183.447, Morrow 1946.210.466, Miller 1965.249.387, Hobart 1984.287.8.22.15] are subject to copyright, and shown under licence from Topham Partners LLP (https:// www.Topham Partners LLP.co.uk/). 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Cultural heritage becomes a source of individual and collective identity, a point of reference from which to conceptualise society and its functioning. Thus, its violent destruction has strong repercussions on the people that identify with it. Drawing from the case of the US occupation of Babylon, a site that lies at the core of Saddam Hussain’s nationalisation efforts, I explore the instrumentalisation of memory within conflictual contexts. I will analyse such instrumentalisation by considering heritage sites through the lens of materiality and object biographies. I then connect Babylon to the concept of iconicity, and how it can be leveraged to embed new narratives to existing sites. Finally, I highlight how heritage is an important field in which conflicts unfold, contributing to the negotiation of power relations between the actors involved. Introduction Cultural heritage lies at the intersection of different areas of interest: it is central to identity and social reproduction, acting as a bridge between present and past. In times of conflict, an important part of the strategic significance of heritage arises from the interplay between its tangible and intangible, social and material aspects. This article aims to make a theoretical contribution to the discussions on heritage in conflict by centring the concept of change, and situating it within theories on memory and materiality. In fact, while debates on damage and conservation have evolved past treating them in dichotomic terms, the conversation can benefit from a single theoretical framework November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 171 that encompasses destruction and construction as part of the same process. The concept of change as framed by this article aims to bring together three established theories that have not been connected before. Heritage sites have often been described in relation to memory, to highlight heritage sites as central hotspots to the creation and reproduction of identity by the people connected to them. In this context, damage to sites has often been understood in terms of harm to memory and identity. To further complexify this dynamic, I want to frame sites as objects, in order to conceptualise the events they undergo as part of their ‘social life’. This aids in understanding changes to a site as a continuous process encompassing both construction and destruction. However, such a continuous process Figure 1. Photograph by Safa Daneshvar. Photo of Saddam Hussain palace over Babylon’s ruins, Hillah, Iraq. (This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license). 172 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 of change is influenced by the relations between the communities involved with the site. As such, it is necessary to link the life history of heritage sites to the idea of memory, and the theme of iconicity. In fact, iconicity merges the intangible importance of sites with their materiality, and how such materiality enables people to interact with them, for instance by apporting tangible modifications. These changes are guided by the power relations between the groups surrounding the site, and the symbolisms that they ascribe to the site. These three aspects can thus be leveraged to negotiate relations between the groups involved. The case study: recent history of Babylon Babylon is an ancient Akkadian city located south of Baghdad. During the 1980s, the Baath Party led by Saddam Hussain started a monumental work of reconstruction of the historic site. The project included the restoration of the palace of Nebuchadnezzar II with new bricks bearing the inscription “To King Nebuchadnezzar in the reign of Saddam Hussein”, as well as new elements such as a modern palace erected on the ancient riverbed (fig. 1) (Barhani 2006; Isakhan 2013; 224, Yuan 2023; Kathem & Kareem 2021). The project was part of a nationalisation campaign, drawing from the history of Mesopotamia and classical Islam to unify people in Iraq across ethnic and religious divisions under the Baath party’s rule and values. In doing this, Saddam “appropriated” the narrative of glory and accomplishment that characterised colonial imageries (Kathem & Kareem 2021: 836) and reframed it to serve his political aims. In 2003, despite surviving the bombing during the invasion of Iraq, the site suffered significant damage due to looting (Barhani 2005) and the placement of a large military camp on the site by the United States (fig. 2), which later hosted Polish troops (fig. 3). This led to irreversible damage. The movements of heavy war machinery broke the floor beneath. Trenches were built using ancient soil, thus ruining the stratigraphy, while parts of the area were flattened to construct a helicopter landing zone and parking lots. In addition, nine animal figures from the Ishtar Gate went missing (Barhani 2006, Moussa 2008, Al Jazeera, 2005; Curtis 2009). November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 173 Figure 2. U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate 1st Class Arlo K. Abrahamson. US Navy 030524-N-5362A-010 U.S. Marines, assigned to the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force (1st MEF), stand guard duty at a palace compound, Wikimedia Commons, (as a work of the US federal Government, it is in the public domain in the United States). To this date, the legacy of Saddam and Western narratives left an imprint on how the residents of the city of Hilla, neighbouring the site, view Babylon. Many interviewees told Kathem and Kareem (2021, p.840) that they consider the site with a “sense of achievement” and a “core part of Iraqi culture”, as well as holding “global importance”. Consequently, the damage caused by the US and Polish occupation of the site was commonly considered a “violation of Iraqi identity and heritage” (ibid., p.837). The site of Babylon, thus, continues to be culturally and politically relevant to current communities and warrants a careful examination of why it continuously emerges as a flashpoint for destruction and construction amidst conflictual contexts. 174 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 3. Photograph by Department of Defense. American Forces Information Service. Defense Visual Information Center. A Polish Army Soldier takes a break while performing security at the main entrance (Reno) to Camp Babylon, Iraq during Operation IRAQI FREEDOM, National Archives Catalog (This photograph is in the public domain in the United States). Theorising sites as objects: intersecting memory and object biographies A common element of discussions on Babylon is, understandably, the emphasis on destructive events. Yet, the recent history of the site presents a more complex picture of construction and destruction, in which construction itself can be destructive. To rethink the implications of conflicts on memory, I want to start by conceptualising heritage sites as objects. Especially in the case of sites that have sustained violent damage, the focus is often destruction, rather than the broader process of transformations that brought the site to the present day. Theoretically, the tension between destruction and construction and their impact on memory can be understood through Appadurai’s (1986) concept of the ‘social life of things’. Appadurai (ibid.) develops this idea in relation to commodities, and argues that objects that are exchanged carry value that is embedded in them. Of course, a heritage site is not a commodity under Appadurai’s criteria of exchangeability (ibid.:13). However, exchanges are not the only way objects can be interacted with. Kopytoff (1986) argues that November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 175 objects, like people, can be approached through a biographical perspective. He posits that biographies tend to select what events and aspects of someone’s life are to be commemorated and how to frame them. I want to analyse the recent history of Babylon through the lens of object biography as a way to overcome the construction/destruction dichotomy. The events of the last few decades at the site do not present planned, deliberate destructive attacks on the site, and yet destruction has taken place, contributing to the trauma of the war. The concept of destruction alone, thus, is not sufficient in understanding the damage made to the site and its repercussions. The concept of change is more useful in understanding the modifications apported to the site in their complexity, as it enables us to steer away from the “negative and positive collections of terms” (Munawar, 2017, p.34) associated with destruction and construction. To understand these social implications, I will thus contextualise the changes apported to the site as events within the ‘object biography’ of Babylon. The social implications of the changes to the site can be better understood by linking this material approach to discussions on memory, to add the depth of time to the entanglements between people and sites. Heritage sites represent a key element in the construction, embodiment, and performance of the past. Nora (1989.) defines memory as a version of the past that is very much alive, emotional and ever-evolving, specific to the group that constructs it. “Sites of memory” are “reconstituted objects” (ibid.:12), places, or practices that become loci of re-evocation of the collective memory of a past that has disappeared and only exists in historical records. Groups draw on these sites to construct their identity and make conscious efforts to safeguard them from oblivion, resulting in a process that involves both modification and crystallisation in recognizable forms. By applying Nora's concept to heritage sites, we can gain insights into their significance in contemporary identity formation. Nora’s elaboration links sites of memory to the building and reproduction of collective identity, further blurring the dichotomy between people and things. 176 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 This approach to memory mirrors the idea of entanglement between objects and humans. Humans need objects both in terms of material livelihood and to shape obligations between each other at a variety of scales. Objects need humans for their production, upkeeping, and definition. Such mutual dependence is unstable and prone to change (Hodder, 2012). While in his discussion Hodder focuses mainly on everyday commodities, the concept can be transposed to heritage sites. In particular, the instability of humanobject relations, then trickling into the instability of human-human relations, can help explain the vulnerability of sites to destruction. Sites of memory attract and focalise the performance of what is constructed as the past, which according to Nora (ibid.) is what constitutes memory in the first place. Thus, heritage sites as sites of memory play a pivotal role in the production and social reproduction of a group, not only due to their presence, but also to the role they play in a community, and the way in which the community interacts with them. The capacity of heritage sites to become fulcri of identity and memory formation can be actively leveraged to try and influence such a process of identity production. According to Benjamin (1968) the appropriation of ruins by nationalistic narratives works by constructing a direct link between past and present groups, assuming them not to change over time. In the case of Babylon, the extent of the success of such appropriation was differential between the different ethnic groups of Iraq (Kathem & Kareem, p.836) but that does not take away from the act of claiming it under Baath authority itself, adding an additional layer of meaning to an already charged site. Benjamin (1968) considers ruins as images isolated from such lineage: ruins are produced in the present, and as such should be analysed. Associating Benjamin and Nora’s ideas highlights how archaeological sites can be promoted as sites of memory as part of a specific project, not simply reproducing but producing memory and identity. In the case of Babylon, the extent of the success of such appropriation was differential between the different ethnic groups of Iraq (Kathem & Kareem, 2021, p.836) but that does not take away from the act of claiming it under Baath authority itself. Such a claim hardly passed under the radar of the US army, turning Babylon from a symbol of Saddam’s influence to a field in which such influence could be contested. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 177 The performance of memory within a site’s biography As discussed, historical sites undergo continuous transformations that shape their present condition. Some can be intentional, such as the reconstruction operated by Saddam Hussain in Babylon. Some can be intentional but not organised as part of a deliberate project of memory, such as the looting that took place. Some can be unintentional, as the effects of weathering and decay are. However, none of them are casual. In discussing heritage conservation, Holtorf (2005) posits that conservation involves loss and destruction, similar to the uninterrupted passage of time, as it preserves certain forms of heritage consumption while preventing others. He argues that history involves change, and such change should be embraced in the approach to conservation. His argument highlights that conservation and reconstruction also involve an element of selective loss, showing that construction and destruction are not mutually exclusive. Moreover, this idea highlights how continuous change contributes to the history of the site itself. However, his discussion neglects the power relations that are inherent in every decision about cultural heritage, and that determine whose interests shape such decisions. Holtorf (2005) claims that conservation is politically motivated by the will to create a desirable collective memory. Yet, deciding not to preserve is not a neutral stance either. Construction, destruction and neglect are all political choices that one or more actors make, and the overall result is highly dependent on the power relations between them. Change is inevitable but it does involve an element of causality in terms of the choices taken. Even the decision to allow weathering can be a deliberate choice, reflecting a particular set of values and priorities. As discussed, the reconstruction of Babylon was part of a precise political project aimed at building nationalist feelings and popular identification with the party. The occupation of the site, in concomitance with the occupation of other monuments of national relevance, also denotes intentionality in the choice of interaction, independently from the intentionality of the damage itself. Placing materiality at the centre of the conversation on heritage, we can better understand how every form of material change is the result of the structures of power in which heritage sites are entangled. As such, centring materiality 178 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 and change in the discussion on heritage in conflicts helps to understand part of the conflict dynamics. In fact, it provides the tools to place every event, from apparently ‘natural processes’ such as decay, to damage and conservation within the decisions – or lack thereof – of the groups involved. Given the relevance of Babylon to multiple communities, the way memory is built upon the site became a matter of contention, and an important instrument to negotiate relations between groups. The US choice of placing the military camp has raised a lot of critiques, and debates on the reasons behind it. Some mention “strategic reasons” (Bailey, 2005). The CNN reports spokesperson Lt. Col. Tamara Parker to have declared the “purpose, among others, of protecting the ruins from looting after the provincial museums in Babylon and Kufa were robbed” (CNN). However, others underline the symbolic value of the site and its international relevance, and what it meant for US troops to take control over it. Isakhan (2013) suggests contextualising the events in Babylon among the occupation and repurposing of various Iraqi heritage sites, both directly connected to the Baath party and ancient, as part of a broader project of de-Baathification. The author notes that the events at Babylon were paralleled by the widespread use of national monuments as bureaucratic or military bases under foreign occupation, such as the Martyr’s Memorial and Saddam’s Palace, as well as the planned deconstruction of monuments of the regime, such as the Arch of Victory (Isakhan 2013). Ultimately there is no official explanation provided: the Archive of White House Official Statements and the US National Archives do not report anything on the topic. However, the Report by Parapetti and Jahjah (2008), published by UNESCO asserts that “This transformation of Babylon into a military base must be seen as putting the seal on a victory, as it had been for Cyrus and Alexander” (p.10). While the damage itself may not have been a deliberate plan, it is hardly unpredictable when planning the construction of trenches and helicopter landing facilities. The same Polish Minister of Defence Jerzy Szmajdzinski stated on Polish state radio that “Where there is war, where there is activity including man’s intervention, there is always some sort of damage". Given the attention that the Allies paid to Saddam’s use of monuments, and November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 179 the international fame of the site of Babylon, it is likely that the meaning invested in Babylon by the Baath party had a role in the decision. In fact, while not directly built by the Party, Babylon was central to its construction of a national identity united under its rule, and taking possession of such symbols of Saddam’s rulership represented a subversion of the association that Saddam drew between himself and the legendary rulers of the city. The key factor that connects the site’s social life to identity and memory is performance. In fact, building on Connerton’s idea of embodiment of memory, it is possible to conceptualise how present performances upkeep memories of past events in an object's life history and create new ones. The dynamism between past and present contributes to a site’s vulnerability during conflicts. Connerton (1989) explains that we perceive the present according to all the past experiences we had: our past experiences are recalled within the present context through embodiment and performance, and as such are influenced by it. This idea implies that the past is not a static and bounded set of events. Rather, memories recall narratives that reproduce events over time as framed in culturally-constructed ways, evoking specific emotional effects. This also entails an element of variability, both among groups and individuals, regarding how the past is recalled. The performative element of memory highlights how people connect with the past through channels that merge the material with the mnemonical. This implies that past and present are not connected in terms of linear causality, but rather by an embodied form of co-production, which involves emotions and performativity. The dynamism and performativity of the past are what define the cultural relevance of a heritage site, as they become sites of production of memory and the identities connected to it. The various layers of meaning can come to define the vulnerability of heritage sites: physical disruption to the site, even just through occupation, becomes a way to negotiate the narratives of the past and present connected to that place. The US military, by occupying the site and leaving permanent marks of their passage, tied the new memory of their occupation to the site, inscribing its biography with their presence and action. This impact extends beyond the present: lasting damages ensure that future recollections and interactions will be affected by the events of 180 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 the occupation as well, reproducing the memory of the war. Nonetheless, heritage sites are not static outside the context of armed conflict, as testified by Saddam Hussein’s modification of the site. The act aims to construct a direct connection between his rule and the rulers that shaped the legendary past of the site (Isakhan 2013), impressing his print on the social life of the site through a form of construction. Through construction and destruction, the materiality of the site mediates the projects that key actors have for the present and the future of the groups connected to the site. These projects become materially embedded in the ‘biography’ of the site, incorporating with it the actors behind such projects. The memory of actors who associated themselves with Babylon through construction and destruction becomes embedded in the collective memory by virtue of the long-standing biography of the site itself. Heritage sites and materiality The process of memory-making through destruction and construction is mediated by the materiality of the sites. The current discourse on materiality grants objects a degree of agency in shaping human-object interactions. Tilley (2007) posits that objects become so not only through interaction between the materials from which they are constituted and of which other objects are made (as per Ingold 2007), but also through their interaction with humans, the history of such interactions, and the value they have been assigned through such interactions. Moreover, Keane (2005) highlights that an object’s characteristics, such as shape, substance, and cultural significance, create allowances that mould and direct how people engage with it. These ideas are valuable to comprehend how the performativity of memory (Connerton 1989; Nora 1989) interacts with the materiality of heritage sites to build their ‘life histories’. Ingold’s emphasis on materials is beneficial to understanding how the tangibility of a site is what enables interaction in the first place, both in terms of construction and destruction. Tilley’s concept helps us appreciate how the site has been associated with a grand past by both the Baath party and Western narratives of ancient Babylon, with differing added layers of identity claims, antagonism, and political connotations. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 181 Moreover, the long history of the site, surviving across multiple millennia, contributes to giving it an aura of immortality. With respect to Keane’s concept, the site of Babylon is characterised by monumental stone buildings and open spaces, allowing visitors to experience them after thousands of years due to the sturdiness of its materials, conformation of the site, and degree of preservation. Such preservation owes much to the reconstruction projects of the 1980s, which rather than undermining the impression of permanence, enhanced it. The historicity and cultural significance of Babylon have earned it its designation as a heritage site. This, in turn, shapes the behaviour of those interacting with it. There is an expectation that visitors treat it with respect and even reverence, yet its materiality can also catalyse transgressions against these expectations. Their tangibility, constructed ability to transcend time, and history of reverential interaction create favourable conditions to inflict and maximise damage, rendering it possible and detectable in the first place. Transformations to a heritage site, destructive and constructive, are rendered striking due to the impression of permanence and longevity that the site transmits through its material characteristics and its long history of interactions. Iconicity: bringing together memory and materiality The concept of iconicity helps to bring together the vulnerability related to the site’s role of signifiers as sites of memory and the site’s characteristic as an object. Beaven (2006) argues that iconoclastic efforts do not simply target an object, but the people and the culture behind it as well (May 2012), if not primarily. Wandel (2012) considers iconoclasm as violence “against images, ‘things’, and “persons”. In her study of iconoclasm in the ancient Near East, May (2012) describes how effigies were considered to hold the power of the individual they represented. In other words, they were icons of their signifier, rather than mere representations. May (2012) also observes that violence against buildings like temples was directly connected to the intended violence against the entity to which it was dedicated. The icon was thus a tangible presence of the signifier, a medium through which people could interact with much bigger entities. The concept of iconoclasm can be adapted to understand the occupation of Babylon. The site of Babylon is complex since 182 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 the boundary between destruction and construction is blurred, with damage to the site being closely linked to the construction of military facilities. In this case, the iconic power of the site is not leveraged through destruction alone and is employed to reshape the power relations between the groups involved. The control over sources of collective memory gives access to significant control over the power relations of that society (Connerton, 1989), having real-life impacts on the populations affected. The changes to the site in the form of its repurposing as a military camp is a powerful image of subjugation that the US military sends to the Baath party. By modifying and reshaping a site so central to Saddam Hussain’s political project, the US military produced a tangible vision of the end of Saddam’s rule over Iraq, as the war was still going on. They employed the iconic power of the site as a metonymy of the conflict, not just in a metaphorical sense but as a tool to achieve control. The intersection between performativity and iconicity, thus, not only influences the past, but can also be instrumental in negotiating present and future experiences. The link between memory and identity, thus, connects the symbolic and physical domination over a site of memory to the project of domination over the party November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 183 References Al Jazeera. 2005, January 10. Report: US Forces Damaged Babylon. Al Jazeera. 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The Damages Sustained to the Ancient City of Babel as a Consequence of the Military Presence of Coalition Forces in 2003. In Stone, P.G. and Bajjaly, J.F. (eds.). The Destruction of Cultural Heritage in Iraq. Woodbridge: Boydell, 143-150. Nora, P. 1989. Between memory and history: les lieux de mémoire. Representations 26(26): 7-24. Parapetti, R., and M. Jahjah. 2008. Systematic Territorial Study of the Ancient Babylon Site. Centro Scavi Di Torino. Tilley, C. 2007. Materiality in materials. Archaeological Dialogues 14(1): 16-20 UNESCO Office for Iraq. 2010. Report on damage to the site of Babylon, Iraq. UNESCO. Website: https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000190812, accessed on 19 August 2023. UNESCO Paris. 2009. International Coordination Committee for the Safeguarding of the Cultural Heritage of Iraq. UNESCO. Wandel, L. P. Idolatry and iconoclasm: Alien religions and reformation. In May, N. (eds.). Iconoclasm and Text Destruction in the Near East and Beyond. Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 485-500. Yuan, S. 2023. After the Iraq War, Saddam’s legendary palaces are open to all. Al Jazeera. Website:https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2023/3/23/after-the-iraq-war-saddams-legendary-palaces-are-open-to-all, accessed on 24 September 2023 November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 185 Untangling Difficult Heritage: Arguing for Equal Linguistic Access for Stakeholders of Past International Conflicts Oliver Moxham Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge [email protected] Abstract This paper is a manifesto for applying the theoretical argument for translational justice — equality through linguistic presence and accuracy — at difficult heritage sites for stakeholder language groups. Decolonizing museum and heritage spaces has dominated debates in the field of archaeology. Difficult heritage sites relating to conflict are no exception (Macdonald 2010, 2015). Transparent discourse between stakeholders is a prerequisite for reconciliation around the difficult past represented by heritage. Theories in translation and heritage studies around language identity support this, demonstrating how the presence of one’s own language creates a feeling of inclusion and consideration essential for reconciliation processes (Baker 2018; Giblin 2022; Inghilleri and Harding 2010). Developing on translation studies theories of “translational justice” (De Schutter 2017; González Núñez 2016; Meylaerts 2006) and the relationship between conflict and translation (Baker 2018), this paper argues for a best-practice translation policy at difficult heritage sites which prioritises facilitating mutual respect and dialogue between stakeholders of international traumatic histories. Introduction In considering how difficult heritage sites are meaningful yet contested by an international public, I propose language and its translation (or lack thereof) as a helpful focus in understanding how differing discourses are created by managers of difficult heritage and in turn interpreted differently by visitors depending on their language. One of the most tangible examples of the role of archaeologists and heritage scholars in shaping public historical discourses is difficult heritage, a term coined by Sharon MacDonald (2010: 1; 2015: 6). 186 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 It has been long established that all heritage is contested due to the diversity of human identity (Tunbridge et al. 1996, 5). Difficult heritage is distinct in referring to sites which recall a past meaningful to the present yet contested and awkward for public reconciliation in a positive manner. In other words, what makes difficult heritage difficult is its controversial history: multiple discordant discourses on the history it represents complicates the creation of a comprehensive official discourse. This is demonstrated well by Hyun Kyung Lee’s (2019) work on how heritage sites left by the Japanese Empire in South Korea have complicated the creation of a national historical discourse. While MacDonald’s work has considered difficult heritage within national contexts of Germany and Britain, I seek to further the transnational approach in the recent works by Lee (2019) and Shu-Mei Huang et al. (2022) understanding the reception and management of difficult heritage, specifically conflict heritage, when engaged by an international, multilingual public. In the age of mass tourism, it is necessary to consider how someone visiting a country which within living memory was at war with their homeland might interpret or identify themselves in relation to national war heritage they come across in their travels. Furthermore, how managers of such sites react to and accommodate such visitors, if at all, is equally important. I argue that by taking a linguistic approach to heritage we can begin to effectively investigate these issues and perhaps even untangle difficult discourse through promoting best practice for translation at heritage sites. This paper proposes this can be achieved through a bottom-up focus on individual interpretation rather than top-down political discourse, considering individual visitors on a cultural tourism level with the agency to independently challenge authorised heritage discourse. I will begin by explaining how the language groups we belong to affect our interpretation of the texts around us, shaping our semiotic landscapes (Thurlow and Jaworski 2011: 2) and, in turn, the meanings we bring with us to heritage sites where our primary language is not standard. I then address the role of translation in conflict contexts, highlighting the translator as an actor rather than a passive intermediary (Baker 2018: 107; Tang 2007: 136), capable of presenting biassed opinion as authoritative fact. From this, I discuss how November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 187 this creates divergent discourses and interpretations within a single heritage site which could facilitate post-conflict reconciliation (Giblin 2014: 513). Finally, I demonstrate how a policy of translational justice recently developed by translation studies scholars can be applied to address issues of divergent discourses and interpretation at difficult heritage sites (De Schutter 2017: 17, 23; González Núñez 2016: 7–8; Meylaerts 2006: 61). I argue that by informing best translation practice at sites of difficult heritage, heritage scholars can facilitate reconciliatory public historical discussion around past conflicts, whose memory is still a source of tension and social harm on local, national, and international levels. Language, identity, and translation Let us begin with a definition of language. A language is a system of codes agreed upon by a community linking objects and concepts with meanings (Gontier 2022: 610). Linguistic anthropologist Charles Taylor (2006: 21, 33) describes language as the creation of a shared “semiotic dimension” where the meanings and use of certain codes can be contested, and new associations created. The most familiar category of such semiotic dimensions are the linguistic systems officially adopted by nation-states, such as English, French, and Japanese, regulated and standardised through school curricula and national media. Judith Irvine (2006: 689, 697) proposes that those who share a common understanding of a language can be considered part of a “language community”, although this is not an exclusive body existing in cultural isolation. Furthermore, a language community should not be equated to national citizenship. For example, while over 99% of Japanese speakers are Japanese citizens, there are those who after significant study make themselves a member of the language community (Paul et al. 2014). In other words, one can be a member of the Japanese language community without being Japanese. It is important to note that language is not limited to the lexical, however; meaning can also be conveyed through non-lexical means such as appearance, body language, performance, and speech. While this article focuses primarily on lexical interpretation, we must establish that the primary locus of language 188 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 is conversation between conversational partners, or “interlocuters”, within a language community (Taylor 2006: 32). This could be a verbal exchange, an author speaking to a reader, or a pair of dance partners. Taylor (2006: 33) argues this creates the common space in which meanings can be expressed, debated, and codified into a certain semantic dimension before manifesting in other forms of communication. While more could be said on the hierarchy of diglossia between parent languages and dialects (see Ferguson 2016; Igarashi 2020; Irvine 2006), this is a suitable understanding of language for the purpose of this paper. The focus of this paper is specifically on the translation and interpretation of lexical language at difficult heritage sites, leaving discussion on interpreting visual, performative, and otherwise non-lexical languages to potential future publications. The relationship between language and identity has grown ever stronger in the Information Age,1 with affordable international travel and mass availability of and exposure to languages and cultures other than our own through the internet and other popular media. This engagement with other language communities, referred to as “language contact” by Weinreich (1953) and Cohen (1956), was originally used to understand the development of pidgin languages, loan words, and other modes of communication developed in a nation-state framework of colonial and post-colonial contexts. Today language contact occurs for all those with internet access on a daily basis, through public translations, multilingual marketing materials, and online spaces where new, forum-specific languages are forming (Crespo-Fernández 2015: 10). Surrounded by established and emergent lexical languages, it is plain to see the linguacultural horizons of our semiotic landscapes — that is, the visual imagery, nonverbal, architectural communication as well as lexical texts and discourses that make up our informational world (Thurlow 1 First coined by Castells (1996), the Information Age refers to the third industrial revolution in the mid-20th century ushered in by long-distance mass communication through computer networks, creating an information-based economy. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 189 and Jaworski 2011: 2). Briefly put, we are increasingly aware of the other worlds of meaning that exist parallel to our own familiar semiotic landscape without needing to belong to the language communities they are built upon. Consequently, lexical languages act as a point of accessibility and group identity in both online and transnational contexts. For example, we might consider a heritage site, business, or website unwelcoming or irrelevant to our language community if the languages present are unfamiliar and inaccessible. In the absence of lexical access, we therefore fall back on applying meaning from our own semiotic landscapes to the non-lexical texts we encounter, if we choose to engage at all. In the context of heritage, this paper argues the presence of a visitor’s first language at a site is a major factor in determining their capacity to not only interpret the space but to identify with it and its discourse therein. The role of the translator in facilitating this, particularly with conflict discourses, shall be discussed in the next section. Translating conflict heritage Demand for translation has risen in response to increased engagement with texts from language communities other than our own. Automated translation services such as Google Translate have risen in prominence to facilitate on-demand communication between language communities (De Vries et al. 2018: 417; Maulidiyah 2018: 512); however, automated translation alone is insufficient in facilitating linguistic access and interpretation due to a significant loss of nuance that can only be achieved through bilingual or professional translators (Maulidiyah 2018: 522). Even then, translation cannot be thought of as an impassionate, infallible conversion of meaning between languages, especially where conflict discourses are concerned, as the biases of the translator must be accounted for. In this section I will explain the goal of translation as negotiating meaning, demonstrate how selective translation has been used to distort conflict discourses, and finally discuss the gap between official discourse and interpretation. It is taken for granted that the goal of translation is to facilitate the communication of information between language communities; however, the nature of translation and the agency of translators is a matter of much debate 190 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 within translation studies (González Núñez and Meylaerts 2017; Katan 2018; Latour 1984; 2017; Waeraas and Nielsen 2016). Bruno Latour’s actornetwork theory approach to translation provides a fundamental framework of the process, theorising translation as a transmission of information, or connection, between nodes, nodes being human and non-human actors in the network with political power (Latour 2017: 177). The political power of actors in translation in actor-network theory is often analogized by researchers today through Michel Callon’s essay on the sociology of translation (Waeraas and Nielsen 2016: 237), where four ‘moments’ of translation become apparent: (a) problematization, (b) interessement, (c) enrolment, and (d) mobilisation (Callon 1984: 196). In brief: problematization sees an actor suggest a problem while convincing others it has the correct solutions; interessement is where the actor seeks to define the interest of the other by defining their role in relation to the problem; enrolment sees the actor suggest how the ascribed role of the other guides their actions in relation to the problem; and mobilisation ensures a wider network is maintained to support the actor’s translation (Callon 1984: 196; Waeraas and Nielsen 2016: 238). These theoretical concepts of translation focus on the translator as an actor seeking to assert their point of view over other actors through translation shaped by discursive techniques and driven by political goals (Waeraas and Nielsen 2016: 242). It should be noted that Callon and Latour have disagreed on how translations are interpreted. Where Callon argues that this creates homogenised, standardised interpretations, a “voice of unison” (1984: 223), Latour has argued that the act of interpretation is independent of the intended result of translation and therefore leads to a diverse network of understanding (1984: 276–77). I argue that the reality is a mixture of the two: while the translator may hope their work presents a comprehensive interpretation of the source material to be readily accepted by its audience, there will always be those who contend with the translator’s interpretation when it comes to odds with their own experience and education. At any rate, these foundational theories present the translator as an actor prone to bias, attempting to negotiate meaning from within their own linguacultural horizons to another. In the context of difficult heritage, I suggest that translation and interpretation therefore present a rare space where conflicting historical discourses potentially meet across the November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 191 linguacultural horizon between language communities. This context shall be explored further in the following section. Examples of fallible translators abound in the context of conflict discourse. I define conflict in accordance with Mona Baker’s comprehensive text on translation and conflict as “a situation in which two or more parties seek to undermine each other because they have incompatible goals, competing interests, or fundamentally different values” (2018: 1). Under the umbrella of this broad definition, my research focuses on the discourses of contemporary violent conflict, referring to sustained military action taken by one political entity against another. The discourses of these conflicts can become enduring continuations of the conflict they represent as the entities involved, or their descendants, seek to control the global record of who did what to who, where, and when. In this battleground, translation is a key weapon in convincing valued groups, avoiding antagonising potentially hostile groups, and marginalising minority groups to assert a dominant discourse (Inghilleri and Harding 2010: 166). It achieves this as a performative and interpretative frame, a concept coined by Richard Bauman (1975: 292) and adopted by Baker (2018: 107), whereby literal communication is reworked and presented as “the equivalent of words originally spoken in another language or code”. This can lead to abuses such as selective appropriation, whereby source material favouring a political view is collected, translated in a biassed manner, and presented to the target audience as representative of the whole. For example, Baker refers to the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), which produced high-quality Arabic-English translations of Arabic texts albeit to further the political agenda of Israel by presenting Arabs as antisemitic religious extremists (ibid. 2018: 73–75). This is reminiscent of the fourth step of Callon’s translation process, mobilisation, whereby dominating translations of conflict discourses establishes the translator’s desired interpretation as the “voice of unison” over alternative interpretations (1984: 196, 227). This can also be a product of what Jun Tang refers to as “conflict-unconscious translators”, those who are simply uninformed on 192 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 the sensitivities around the conflict topic they are translating (2007: 146– 47). Whether intentional or otherwise, misinterpretation of such sensitive discourses can lead to real-world harm, such as the perpetuation of racial stereotypes to justify hostilities and persecution as seen in the MEMRI example. Having established the impact of mistranslation of conflict discourses, intentional or otherwise, I will now demonstrate why there is a need for accurate translation of such discourses in the context of heritage. John D. Giblin (2014; Cross and Giblin 2022) has rapidly become the authority on the capacity of heritage to heal divisions that endure in societies once violent conflict has passed. Giblin takes issue with the term “postconflict societies” as he argues conflict is an enduring feature of society and its heritage, and that framing societies as post-conflict through heritage policies inevitably simplifies the complicated network of groups involved as victims and perpetrators (2014: 503–4). Such discourses are vulnerable to abuses like in the MEMRI example, where one party in a conflict seeks to present themselves as the victim worthy of the international community’s sympathy while alienating their former opponents through distributing selectively translated information. Giblin points to heritage institutions in such contexts as being ideal spaces for pursuing post-conflict development of reconciliation and social cohesion between formally hostile parties, although this aim is rarely explicitly pursued in institutions established post-conflict (2022: 245). To effectively address and move forwards from historical traumas, it is necessary to have open discussion between stakeholders in these spaces that tackle the memories of trauma (Giblin 2014: 513). When dealing with multiple language communities, the importance of equally accessible information through informed translation at relevant heritage sites cannot be understated. While Giblin’s studies have focussed on intranational conflicts in Rwanda and Uganda (2014), the same arguments apply to international conflicts. I argue there is a need to determine whether a similar awareness of multilingual stakeholders can be found at November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 193 heritage sites by way of equal translation access. In this section, translation has been established as a key tool in the creation of contested discourses of the past, an authority rarely challenged with the power to include and exclude, to inform and misinform. Good translation here therefore depends not only on the language ability of the translator but also on their familiarity with the discourse in both language communities and negotiating a shared meaning between them. It is also necessary for the translator to recognise their own bias and to avoid presenting it as historic fact through authorised heritage discourse that Smith (2006) conceptualised. This is not only to provide stakeholders with equal linguistic access to their shared history but also to demonstrate that their connection to the site has been considered and accounted for by the heritage management. The following section considers this through applying the concept of translational justice to heritage policy as a potential first step towards untangling difficult heritage for visitors and management alike. Translational justice at difficult heritage sites While the implications of language and translation at cultural heritage sites have been understudied in heritage studies, progressive policies have been debated and developed by translation scholars which could well address the issues raised above. The work of Gabriel González Núñez (2016; 2017), Reine Meylaerts (2006; 2011), and Helder De Schutter (2017) in particular have been instrumental in demonstrating the impact of public translation practice beyond the matter of converting text from a source language to a target one, emphasising the social impact of translation methods and advocating for translational justice in a transnational, multilingual world. I will briefly define translational justice before exploring its benefits and limitations in being applied at cultural heritage sites. De Schutter (2017: 15–16) summarises translational justice in translation policy as a balance between furthering people’s identity and non-identity interests. In the context of public translation policy, this puts the onus on the state to accommodate the interests of its multilingual citizenry. I argue 194 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 this can be equally applied to a heritage context, with heritage management as the responsible actor and its multilingual visitors, in particular stakeholders, as those whose interests should be considered. De Schutter (2017: 17) then presents three policies for implementing translational justice: privation theory, full translation theory, and multilingualism-with-limited-translation theory. These theories refer to policies addressing a nation’s responsibility to communicate with internal language communities either by: educating towards a single common language with minimal translation (privation theory); providing full translation to all language communities as an identitybased language right (full translation theory); or through a combination of the two (multilingualism-with-limited-translation theory, or ‘dual theory’) (ibid. 2017: 20–21, 26, 28–29). In this national context, De Schutter argues for the dual theory as a compromise between providing access and recognition of identity where necessary and beneficial while working towards a common language (ibid. 2017: 29). Given the typically transnational context of conflict heritage, I argue that full translation theory would be the best approach to implement translational justice at these sites as it is unreasonable and impractical to expect stakeholders to speak a common language. If a full translation approach to translational justice were put into practice at a conflict heritage site, several benefits are immediately apparent. Primarily, it puts heritage managers in a position where they must consider who the site is relevant to beyond its national borders. By extension, linguistically accommodating for these stakeholders requires a consideration of how the subject matter at hand is discussed and considered beyond the semiotic landscape and language community of the host nation. This may well have a reflexive effect on the source texts, bringing these transnational perspectives into the semiotic landscape of the local language community. All this furthers the reconciliatory potential of conflict heritage sites highlighted by Giblin, not only acknowledging stakeholders but also informing stakeholder language communities of one another’s presence, significance, and perspective (2014: 513). The most immediate shortcoming of transferring policies of translational justice to a heritage context is how its original argument is based in the limited November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 195 and actionable legislative scope of the nation-state, something not easily transferred to the transnational, discordant context of conflict heritage. There is no heritage body with the political power to enforce universal policy at heritage sites. The UNESCO World Heritage Operation Guidelines 1.A.3 in 2021 are specifically targeted towards heritage site managers; however, those seeking to gain or retain World Heritage status are held accountable to their guidance. Furthermore, while the guidelines recognize the necessity and potential financial cost of translation as well as the need for shared understanding at heritage sites, there is no mention of best translation practice (UNESCO 2021: 35, 137). This reflects a further potential limitation of a full translation approach, as extensive professional translation might well be considered financially unviable by many heritage managers. When it comes to difficult heritage, the onus then falls upon heritage scholars to promote translational justice at sites of transnational significance. If such spaces are to become less ‘difficult’ and have their reconciliatory potential tapped into, I propose a policy of translational justice as an important first step. In putting the theories discussed in this paper to practise, heritage practitioners of difficult heritage sites can work towards untangling contentious discourse through dialogue with stakeholder visitors. Conclusion This paper has addressed the overlooked importance of translation at difficult heritage sites, especially regarding international conflict heritage. By marrying studies of the reconciliatory potential of post-conflict heritage with translation theory, the capacity for dissonant discourses through biassed translation and lack of international perspective at conflict heritage sites has been laid bare. I argue that heritage scholars can begin untangling the difficult discourses that create difficult heritage sites through considering who controls the discourse, which stakeholders identify with the site, and whether or not their identity needs are being met through a full-translation approach. This can inform policy on a case-by-case basis at difficult heritage sites and create the important first step towards reconciliatory intercultural discourse sorely needed in regions suffering from multigenerational post-conflict animosity. 196 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 If heritage provides a means of identifying ourselves within a local, national, global, and human context, then we as heritage specialists must advocate that closer attention be paid to the role of language and translation in facilitating and inhibiting this process. Nowhere is this more important than at sites of difficult heritage where dissonance between discourses presented by the management and discourses brought by the visitors can only be untangled through a translation policy that recognizes stakeholders and strives towards a transnational discourse of respect and recognition if not consensus. 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The Hague: Mouton. 200 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Construction of the Archaeological Inventory of the Sites with Rock Art of the Vides River. Sara Valentina Guerrero Gonzalez University of Avignon svguerrerogo@gmail Abstract This research is an inventory of six rock art sites and the state of their conservation in the Vides River basin in the Amazon region of Colombia. It also discusses the social and economic relationships that the local inhabitants have with these rock art sites. This paper draws theoretical and methodological support from the feminist, decolonial and heart-centred approaches in archaeology. Additionally, the research is complemented by the methodologies of the Colombian Institute of Anthropology and History (ICANH). Finally, a series of reflections are made on the potential of archaeological heritage to construct community social relations Introduction This article proposes the theoretical and methodological grounds for a community-based "inventory of rock art sites in the Vides River'' with suggestions for their conservation. From now on, to refer to sites with rock art, the acronym SAR will be used. The fieldwork was conducted in the villages of Santa Teresa and Sinai in the municipality of Villagarzon, Department of Putumayo in southwest Colombia. The starting question for the research was: What are the rock art sites of the Vides River and what is their current state? (fig. 1) This question in its approach has a technical focus, but required a more sensitive and communitarian approach in order to be adequately answered, even though it did not seem to require it. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 201 The creation of this archaeological inventory arose as a response to the lack of systematic data on the rock art sites of the Vides River and as an initiative to open the field to further archaeological research in the area. In Colombia, when an archaeological site has low documentation, the Colombian Institute of Anthropology and History (ICANH), the highest entity in charge of the archaeological heritage in the country, recommends an investigation focused on archaeological diagnosis. In accordance with these guidelines, the inventory of Vides River rock art sites produced in this article is guided by archaeological diagnosis and therefore meets the official requirements for inclusion in the archaeological data bases of the State. The inventory also takes into account other aspects at the community level, which will be expanded upon later. Geographically, the site is located in the Andean-Amazonian piedmont, an area between the departments of Putumayo and Caqueta. This place is, from an ecological point of view, the border between the Andean and Amazonian regions; it is the place where two great biomes converge. Therefore, the Andean-Amazonian piedmont is considered a zone of interest for investment and conservation. (Wildlife Conservation Society 2021). Currently the inhabitants of the research area are involved in conservation projects to monitor Figure 1. Petroglyphs in SAR of the Vides River, "Piedra La Sabiduria" © Guerrero 2021 202 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 vulnerable fauna (WWF 2014) with the objective of safeguarding the animals and their habitats. It is worth mentioning that environmental protection in this area is closely linked to the protection of archaeological heritage since the "protection and struggle for the territory" (Azuero 2017) includes the protection of all the elements of the landscape and the communities that inhabit it (Guerrero 2022).In other words, the archaeological sites are annexed to the landscape, a landscape that has been the scene of systematic violence and is now a space of resignification of the conflict by the people who inhabit it. In social terms, the study area has been characterized as a place where the Colombian armed conflict occurred (Serje 2005; CNMH 2015). Phenomena such as forced displacement (Urueña 2018), massacres (CNMH, 2012), coca economy (Lyons 2020), and presence of armed groups disputing territorial control (Azuero 2017; Ramirez 2001) occurred throughout the department of Putumayo in the 1990s and 2000s (CNMH 2015; Azuero 2017). In 2016, the Colombian government signed a peace agreement in Havana, Cuba to bring an end to the conflict (Poder Legislativo 2016; CLACSO 2019). However, the violence experienced for more than 50 years has drastically impacted the inhabitants of the department, in their daily lives and in the way they relate to the territory (CNMH 2015). Even now, remembering the past for the communities that inhabit this territory often implies referring to traumatic events. Nevertheless, there are currently other tensions in the area. The interests of the Gran Tierra Energy oil company in Villagarzón and its rural areas is a cause for concern for the communities (Betancourt 2015). For the people of the Santa Teresa and Sinaí villages the presence of oil companies constitutes a threat because, with oil exploitation projects, environmental and sociocultural well-being is put at risk (CNMH 2015; Azuero 2017; Guerrero 2022). The resulting inventory of rock arts in the Vides River contributes to expanding the knowledge of the past of the Amazon region and is an input for future research, as it serves as a proof of the archaeological richness of this area in Colombia. The findings demonstrate that it is an area of high archaeological potential according to ICANH criteria: “representativeness, uniqueness and integrity” (ICANH 2021: 26), which will be developed in the results section. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 203 Likewise, it is an archaeological site valued by the current communities that is part of economic dynamics, belonging, identity and commitment to the territory. Building a community care-based approach to archaeological inventory Taking into account the context of historical violence experienced in this area, I asked myself: What kind of archaeology could be appropriate for a place where life has been at risk? What does it mean to think about the past from a painful and still problematic present? My answer was that the kind of archaeology should be a critical archaeology conscious of the pain that the communities have suffered, conscious of their current territorial struggles and highly sensitive to the social and historical characteristics of this territory. I thought that this should be an archaeology for life, an archaeology for peace. This meant mainly listening to the communities and their own interests about the territory they inhabit and creating a relationship of trust with them while conducting this research. Meanwhile, I was engaged in documenting the existence of rock art sites and their physical characteristics. After the previous reflection, for the purpose of this research, I focused on the idea of feminist archaeologies, for which the methodology must be a critical construction in each case study (Berrocal, 2009: 25). From this idea, I made a union of institutional methodologies of archaeological inventories in Colombia that allowed me to address the technical and quantitative aspects of the sites with rock art, with theoretical and methodological resources of feminist, decolonial and heart-centred approaches. The union of these two frameworks made it possible to give an explanation of the physical and technical aspects of the SARs while giving a relevant place to the social and historical relationships of the communities with the archaeological sites. Archaeological background Historically, most of the archaeological research conducted in the Colombian Amazon has been immersed in multiple power relations and myths that have caused an analytical and conceptual stagnation, where this immense territory —which is erroneously considered homogeneous — has 204 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 been observed as an area with low population density, with low technological development, and with a culture derived from cultural borrowings from Andean populations (Herrera 1986; Meggers 1948; Meggers 1977; Meggers and Evans 1957; Meggers and Evans 1961; Meggers and Miller 2006). Likewise, the armed conflict, the costs of travel to the region and the lack of infrastructure are social aspects that have hindered the archaeological study of the Colombian Amazon and Putumayo (Aceituno 2010: 18). However, between 2016 and 2020, during the construction of oil platforms of the Gran Tierra Energy company, three significant findings were made in the department, which changed the archaeological perspective on Putumayo. These are the oil platforms Cumplidor in Puerto Asis (Sanchez 2019), Pomorroso (Reyes 2019) in Valle del Guamuez, and Vonu-Este in Villagarzón (Calderon 2020). At Cumplidor, abundant ceramic material was found and 3 carbon -14 dates were extracted: one sample related to a hearth from 2450 +/-60 BP; the second from a concentration of ceramic fragments from 1980 +/-10 BP and finally a fragment from 860 +/-30 BP (Sanchez 2019:10). The evidence from this archaeological site added to those found in Pomorroso add up to 20 tons of cultural material, these evidences are currently exhibited in the Suruma Museum in Mocoa (Reyes 2019). Finally, in Vonu, 22,178 archaeological elements were found, of which there is evidence of two periods of occupation: the first from 700 AD to 1100 AD and the second from 1100 AD to 1600 AD (Calderon 2020: 316). The above findings serve as an input for future discussions on the classic ideas of depopulation of this part of the Amazon, small settlements and low technological development (Herrera, 1986; Meggers, 1971; Meggers and Evans 1973; Meggers and Miller, 2006). Currently, the analysis of the material evidence from Pomorroso, Cumplidor and Vonu Este is a challenge for new researchers in the region. For now, one can imagine that these findings open the door to think that the anthropic presence in the Andean-Amazonian piedmont has been long, complex and interesting. Now, with respect to the SARs of the Santa Teresa and Sinai villages in the municipality of Villagarzon, Putumayo, these were mentioned for the first November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 205 time in the article "the seated man: myths, rites and petroglyphs in the Caqueta river" (Urbina 1994). Subsequently, between 1998 and 2000, researchers Martín Roa (1998), Hector Llanos and Jorge Alarcón (2000) referred again to these manifestations in other archaeological works in the south of the country. On the other hand, in the framework of contract archaeology projects since 1997, the company INGETEC reported the existence of the SARs of the Vides River in a report made in the framework of the Andaki project (1997). Subsequently in other reports of contract archaeology projects developed in the department of Putumayo the existence of the SARs of the Vides River was mentioned, these were superficial mentions that only referred to the presence of rock art but did not expand the information (Becerra 1998; Perez and Olave 2010; Sanchez 2019; Calderon 2020). A common element of the previous sources (Becerra 1998; Pérez and Olave 2010; Sánchez 2019; Calderón 2020) is that they are descriptive records about some characteristics of the SARs. However, these texts do not contain data related to their number, location, and conservation status. The absence of the aforementioned SAR data for the Vides River constituted a problem because it prevented the creation of management measures appropriate to the particular needs of this site. This includes conservation, safeguarding, administration and research actions, all of which are the responsibilities of the local authorities and the civilian population. This responsibility is also a matter of law, as the SARs are immovable cultural properties of the nation and so are covered by a legal framework that commits all citizens and state institutions to ensuring their care (Law 397 of 1997). Methodology For the development of the methodology, institutional resources of the Colombian State designed to inventory archaeological sites were used. In that order, elements were taken from the methodologies established by the Ministry of Culture of Colombia in the "Manual of Inventory of Movable Property" (2005) and by the ICANH (2021, 2010). Likewise, elements were taken from the master's proposal "Guidelines for the patrimonial 206 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 management of sites with rock art in Colombia as an input for its social appropriation" by Diego Martínez (2015), since it contributes to understand these archaeological sites as units of analysis that include elements of the rocks where it is carved or drawn as well as the surrounding landscape. Taking into account that there was little or no information about the Vides River SARs, according to the ICANH research modalities (2010), a diagnostic and reconnaissance study on the presence and spatial distribution of the ARs was carried out. The ICANH's “Fichas de Hallazgos Fortuitos”, the official document recognized by the State where the technical and quantitative data were consigned, was used to collect information. The use of this card is recommended by the methodologies of the Ministry of Culture (2005), Diego Martínez (2015) and the guidelines given by ICANH (2021). These documents recommended how to collect information on the landscape surrounding the SARs, their state of conservation and the level of access to the sites that was also collected in the fieldwork. Simultaneously, the critical feminist approach (Conkey and Spector 1984; Wyle 2007; Berrocal 2009) was applied in the collection of previous information, giving a privileged place to reflexivity in the analysis of the sources. Much of the archaeological literature and some historical sources reproduced colonial and androcentric biases. With this approach we were able to detect a connection between ideas related to low population density, low technological development, and a culture derived from cultural borrowings from Andean populations (Herrera 1986; Meggers 1948, 1977; Meggers and Evans 1957, 1961; Meggers and Miller 2006), with practices of physical and symbolic violence that began in the sixteenth century and continue to the present. It is a violence exercised by colonizers or explorers, and later by the State itself, towards the native and settler communities of the territory (Tovar 1996; Flores 2009; Flores 2009; Arcila 2010; González 2012; Sánchez Steiner 2012; Betancourt 2015; CNMH 2015; Azuero 2017; Uribe 2017; Palacio 2018; Urueña 2018; Revelo 2019; Rincon 2022). Ideas such as the savagery of the communities (Tovar 1996) and the conception of nature as a barrier in opposition to cultural development (Mora 2006), have been applied for the inclusion of the Amazon region to the Nation-State as well as for its academic study. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 207 Therefore, the decolonial approach proposed by the Brazilian author Loredana Ribeiro (2017), which proposes the need for the construction of knowledge that advocates for the recognition of social justice of groups historically subalternized by patriarchy, colonialism and imperialism (Ribeiro 2017; Trigger 1984), was applied transversally in the research. It was applied mainly with the approach that an archaeology for the preservation of life and the promotion of peace was to be done. This was done taking into account the interests of the communities that inhabit the area where the SARs are located. In this order, a participatory work was constituted through a constant dialogue with the communities. As a result, this work was to serve as an information document for local tourism initiatives that work with archaeological and environmental tourism. At the end of the research, a short documentary was made with the results and supporting brochures were designed; this documentary was presented at the fourth Putumayo Film Festival under the title "Retornos" (fig. 2) (Returns), which received an honourable mention. Figure 2. Poster of the short film "Retornos 208 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Currently, the community has copies of the research, pedagogical material and the documentary for free use. The four basic pillars of heart-centred archaeology: rigor, relationality, care and emotion (Supernant et al. 2020), served to establish relationships with the archaeological record and with the communities. How these four pillars were helpful will be discussed in the considerations. Research Process: Participatory Fieldwork The above methodology was put into practice during the fieldwork that took place during a week in October 2021.Before entering the rural area a meeting was held with community leaders to ask for permission and support. This was given and mutual collaboration agreements were reached between the community and me as a researcher. When I arrived in the field I spoke with the inhabitants of the villages of Santa Teresa and Sinai, and was informed about the activities to be carried out, and the assistants agreed to participate in the research. The work began with the tours that were made with the help of the community around the sites that they had recognized as SARs. Likewise, the locals did maintenance and constant surveillance of the SARs, so finding them was not a costly job. They, with some years of work, had built routes to visit them, signs and signage at several of the sites. They also made their own interpretations of the petroglyphs as we went along the routes. In each SAR, the group stopped, GPS coordinates were taken, ICANH's Fichas de Hallazgos Fortuitos were filled out, and a photographic and video record of the petroglyphs was made. Likewise, the locals were listened to talk about the meanings they gave to each one of the representations, in the listening moments the pillars of relationality, emotion and care were applied, with attentive listening to the stories and with the inclusion of this information in the results. On the other hand, five interviews were conducted with inhabitants of the communities to inquire about their knowledge of the SAR, as well as to better understand the importance of the SAR at the social level. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 209 After the tours, a meeting was held on the banks of the Vides River with the community of Santa Teresa and Sinai to thank them for their support throughout the process. Here the principle of emotionality was applied, since a collective act of gratitude strengthened the relationship of closeness with the community and the territory. Approximately 40 people from Inga and Embera peasant and indigenous communities of different age groups participated in the activity. During the meeting the attendees made interventions related to the importance of protecting the natural and archaeological heritage, and a thanksgiving ritual was performed (fig. 3). To conclude the field work, a mapping exercise was carried out with the children of Santa Teresa, a group of 10 children between Figure 3. Thanksgiving ritual with the community © Guerrero 2021 Figure 4. Mapping exercise with children from Santa Teresa and Sinai © Guerrero 2021 210 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 3 and 10 years old (fig. 4). The objective was to draw the important places in their neighbourhood. Several of the drawings represented the school, the field, the community hut and an SAR near the hamlet, a place that stands out because it is located next to the main bridge. Results In this research, six sites with rock art were found in an area of 359300.4 km2 between the Santa Teresa and Sinai villages. A total of 105 petroglyphs with anthropomorphic, zoomorphic and geometric figures were recorded (Table 1). The area has a high archaeological potential, because the set of six SARs found in the fieldwork meet the ICANH criteria: representativeness, uniqueness and integrity (ICANH 2021: 26). Their representativeness is due to the fact that the SARs show the presence of human groups in the Andean-Amazonian piedmont that modified the environment through a series of interventions in the rocks around the Vides River. The uniqueness of these sites corresponds to the fact that they are the only SARs reported so far in this area of Putumayo, i.e., between the municipalities of Villagarzón and Mocoa, where abundant archaeological evidence of other types has been found (Calderon 2020). Finally, the criterion of integrity is met, since 90% of the petroglyphs have a high degree of conservation, i.e., 95 of the 105 petroglyphs are in good condition. Regarding the social use of the SARs, Table 1. Technical information on the SARs November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 211 83.3% or five of the six SARs are related to community tourism activities. Through the interactions with the community, it can be said that archaeosocial relationships were found that have to do with the representative role of the SARs in local identities, belonging to the territory and a series of affections and commitments that the communities have acquired to conserve the SARs in their villages. One of these actions is the constant maintenance of the trails and the signs that the community has made to access the sites. The inhabitants of the communities of Santa Teresa and Sinai highly value the SARs, and include them in their daily lives and in their future projects, such as the archaeological tourism project, which encourages the communities to work together for a common goal. This type of tourism is currently presented as an alternative to the coca economy that has dominated since 1990 in the department (CNMH 2015). At the moment, the success of this new economic activity is not clear, as it is just beginning to develop, but the villagers are working with the hope that it will be successful and that they will be able to improve their quality of life as a result. Likewise, in the mapping workshop with children it was found that some of them recognized a SAR as part of their village; this is an interesting point to promote future activities of social appropriation of archaeological sites that include the child population. The relationship between these communities and the SARs has allowed the reactivation of community bonds of solidarity deteriorated by the war and cycles of violence. The SARs have undergone a process of patrimonial valorisation by the communities that are in daily contact with them. This is a case of social appropriation of the archaeological heritage at the service of peace building managed by the victims of the conflict themselves. It is also a case study that shows that archaeology can be committed to the communities of the present and their problems. 212 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Considerations With this information it can be said that it is necessary to continue with the integration of this information in the Archaeological Atlas of Colombia and formulate an archaeological management plan (ICANH, 2021), which is a guiding document to ensure the conservation and safeguarding of these material evidences (fig. 5). The formulation of this archaeological management plan requires the active participation of the communities of both villages, including the different actors within them, such as the indigenous communities that inhabit these villages. The SARs are of social and economic importance, so the management measures must be in accordance with the needs of the communities and in favour of the safeguarding of the SARs. An archaeological management plan that leaves out the social sphere of the SARs could affect the current relationships already established between the community and archaeological sites. The critical approach of feminist archaeologies (Conkey and Spector, 1984; Wyle 2007; Berrocal 2009), decolonial (Ribeiro 2017), and the theoreticalmethodological pillars of heart-centred archaeologies (Supernant et al. 2020) contributed to the inventory methodologies proposed by the Ministry of Culture (2005) and Martínez (2015) and to the recommendations given by ICANH (2021) for this research, insofar as they allowed the treatment of SAR information from a historical, social and sensitive perspective while accounting for the technical characteristics of these cultural assets. In that order, the quality of the information improved as access to the site was obtained through the bonds of trust. Group work was carried out with the community, who gave their interpretations of the SARs. The physical aspects of these archaeological assets and also their socio-economic role for the local inhabitants were reported. This study was highly committed to disseminating the results and the communities now have copies of the research, educational material and a short documentary film that they can use for their tourism projects. The application of the four principles of heart-centred archaeologies (Supernant et al. 2020) was key to achieve the development of the research in its different stages. The principle of rigor refers to reviewing each and every November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 213 aspect of the research, both in the categories used and in the present scenario in which the research is developed, with an emphasis on self-reflexivity (Supernant et al. 2020: 6-7). This principle is reflected in the research both in the analysis of previous sources and in the collection of data on the sites with rock art in the field, which complements the critical feminist approach explained above. The second principle, relationality, recognizes the importance of relationships within human groups but also relationships with non-human actors, including archaeological materialities and landscapes (Supernant 2020: 10). It was taken into account when understanding that sites with rock art for the inhabitants of the veredas were connected to their natural and social environment, including with community resistance processes. That is to say, the SARs for the communities occupied a space in the landscape that was connected with the river, the animals, and even with the current struggle between the communities and the oil company Gran Tierra Energy, since they constitute an "inheritance" for which they feel responsible. Therefore, when asked in the interviews about the SAR, the inhabitants included them in environmental and community resistance narratives. The pillar of care takes up Carol Gilligan's (2014) ethical proposal of care, according to which speaking of care implies striving for the integral health and wellbeing of the individual and the group (Supernant 2020: 8). In conducting this research, care has to do with the idea of not damaging (Gilligan 2014), this includes not harming the archaeological record, which includes not generating alterations on the surface of the SAR or its environment at the time of the visits, as well as not harming the welfare of the communities with discriminatory and offensive practices. Care is also taken in the responsibility after the field work, in the delivery of the expected results and products: copy of the research, documentary, and pedagogical material, together with explanatory talks and screening sessions of the documentary at the sites. The principle of emotionality admits that emotions are situated in a cultural spectrum and vary according to each group, both in the past and in the present. This is not intended to share the beliefs and values of communities, but to recognize that they play an active role in the construction of the communities' 214 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Figure 5. Petroglyphs in SAR of the Vides River, “Piedra Pintada”. past (Supernant 2020: 11). Emotionality is taken into account to understand that the archaeological materialities evoke a series of feelings and affections for the communities of the present, this was also evidenced in the interviews with the inhabitants of the community and the information related to the affections between the community and the SARs is included in the inventory document. In that order, the quality of the information was improved to the extent that access to the site was obtained through trust. Group work was carried out with the community, who contributed their interpretations of the SARs. Information was provided on the physical aspects of these archaeological assets and also on their socio-economic function for the local inhabitants. This study was very committed to disseminating the results and the communities now have copies of the research, educational material and a short documentary film that they can use for their tourism projects. This case study allows us to take a look at how to conduct archaeological research in a context where violence and war have been a continuum. This type of phenomena has occurred throughout Colombia (CNMH 2013; Poder Legislativo 2016), therefore an archaeology that thinks about generating research seeking the welfare of communities is completely relevant. Archaeological studies consented by the communities and aligned with local November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 215 interests can contribute to the creation of deep and meaningful ties with the past and at the same time reinforce the sense of belonging to a territory. At the same time this type of research with an approach that prioritizes the social relations of the present with the archaeological record can serve as a tool for the local inhabitants, in this case a whole process of diffusion of the results was done and they are currently used for tourist purposes by the same communities. In Colombia the transition to legal economies is a peace commitment (Poder Legislativo 2016), archaeology can support this type of economic transitions through the production of research that dialogues with social realities. 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Piedemonte andino-amazonico. https://colombia.wcs.org/ es-es/Paisajes/Piedemonte-Andino-Amazonico.aspx World Wide Fund for Nature WWF.2014. Encuentran oso de anteojos en Putumayo. https:// www.wwf.org.co/?214972/Encuentran-oso-de-anteojos-en-Putumayo Wylie, Alison.2002. Thinking from Things, essays in the philosophy of archaeology. University of California Press, Berkely. Wylie, Alison.2007) Doing Archaeology as a Feminist: Introduction. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory. 14:209-216. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 225 Exploring the Complex Relationship between Archaeology and Society: Lessons from India's History Aritri Samadder University of Cambridge [email protected] Abstract This paper discusses the relationship between archaeology and society, arguing that the discipline can be used to serve multiple agendas. The paper explores the influence of archaeology on the public and investigates how political manipulation of history affects the archaeological practices of the Archaeological Survey of India. It uses the Babri Masjid demolition as a case study, highlighting the role of social memory in historical discourse. The author concludes that archaeology can serve as a tool to satisfy multiple agendas, even if they are sometimes contradictory. The paper suggests that policies regulating the misuse of archaeological information should be put in place to mitigate the loss of intellectual and cultural property and prevent the loss of valuable human life. Introduction For the general public in India, the term ‘archaeology’ is not used in everyday conversation but everyone interacts with at least one piece of ‘material culture’ every day albeit unknowingly. People are intertwined with their past and history and everything they interact with in the present is related to it. This understanding can become a very impactful tool to move and motivate people toward particular agendas. Archaeology, as an academic discipline, pursues a fundamental objective: the preservation, management, and conservation of historical artifacts for future generations (Fagan, 2006). In archaeological research, three key objectives prevail: 1) establishing cultural chronology (form), 2) reconstructing ancient ways of life (function), and 3) interpreting and elucidating cultural transformations. These objectives collectively serve the over226 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 arching purpose of safeguarding the archaeological legacy (Fagan, 2006). This endeavour aims to enlighten society about its past, recover forgotten aspects, and restore fragments of history to individuals who might have lost parts of their identity due to deliberate erasure and oppression. Archaeology is for the public, a sentiment especially poignant with the fruition of the “impact” agenda – which exerts pressure on governments to demonstrate how archaeological research and conservation benefit society. Here, the ‘public’ refers to simply groupings of individual people (Rawlins and Bowen 2005). In an attempt to unpack the complex relations between archaeology and society through the following case, it can also be portrayed how archaeology and its inherent subject that is ‘for’ the public can be used ‘against’ the public as well. The term 'for' denotes positive outcomes that benefit the general public or specific communities without detriment to others' interests. Conversely, 'against' signifies negative repercussions, causing harm to particular individuals and disrupting public harmony. Therefore, it is imperative to establish precautionary measures to minimize such adverse effects and ensure the positive impact of archaeology on society. The Babri Masjid Case History and Demolition It is speculated that the Babri Masjid (Mosque of Babur) in Ayodhya was originally constructed in 1528 by Mir Baqi, a courtier of the Mughal Emperor Babur. This mosque has been a site of contention between the Hindus and Muslims in India since the 1880s, leading to communal riots, a leftover symptom of colonisation. The mosque was allegedly built by demolishing a temple from earlier times marking the location of Ramajanmabhumi, (the birthplace of the Hindu God Rama) (Johnson‐Roehr 2008). The legal dispute can be traced back to the 1880s when the first contention occurred when Sunni Muslims claimed that the temple in nearby Hanumangarh was built after demolishing a mosque. The archaeological landscape had November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 227 been slowly changing since the 15th and 16th centuries when the city’s older sites became ‘Rama-tized’ over the earlier association of Vaishnavism, a major Hindu religious sect before the era of Lord Rama. Bakker (1986) conducts a comprehensive analysis of the archaeological remains at the primary pilgrimage sites in and around Ayodhya, coupled with a comparative examination of different versions of the city's traditional pilgrimage guide, the Ayodhyamahatmya. This text exhibits a gradual elimination of non-Vaisnavite (devoted to the god Visnu) pilgrimage sites within the city, a phenomenon that persisted in the earliest versions from the 13th and 14th centuries AD. The artificial transformation of the Ramaite landscape becomes apparent iwhen these older sites are retroactively integrated into Rama-centric narratives, tracing their origins back to the semi-mythical Tretayuga period, during the reign of the Iksvaku dynasty to which Rama belonged (Bakker 1986: 160). A similar trend is observed in the comparison of pilgrimage routes documented in these texts. Fig 1: “The Babri Masjid” ([Babri Masjid, Faizabad]. Albumen print, Getty Museum. Public domain photograph. - PICRYL - Public Domain Media Search Engine Public Domain Image, 2023) 228 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 The earlier routes, encompassing Saivite (related to the Hindu god Siva) or local cult sites, evolve into standardized Ramaite paths. Even the Janmabhumi, although mentioned in the earliest version of the Ayodhyamahatmya, becomes a part of the pilgrimages only after the period when it was purportedly destroyed. Thus, the significance of most pilgrimage sites in Ayodhya is inherently unstable, continually changing based on factors such as sect, caste, time, or season. This religious fluidity, evident in both the texts and Ayodhya's archaeological terrain, contributed to the Ramajanmabhumi fiasco (Shaw 2000). In the constant ebb and flow of discontent between the Hindus and the Muslims, in December 1992, Hindu extremists forcefully entered the mosque, resulting in its destruction and subsequent ruin (Berbeck and Pollock, 1996). In 1949, an idol of Rama was placed outside the disfigured Mosque. In 1950, a suit was filed in Faizabad district court seeking the right to worship the idol. Throughout the next few decades, there were multiple lawsuits from individuals and groups with different religious backgrounds seeking possession of the disputed land like that of the Nirmohi Akhara in 1959 later followed by the UP Sunni Central Waqf Board in 1961 demanding similar rights to the land (Outlook 2022). Despite attempts at finding common ground and negotiating between conflicting interests, the Babri Masjid was eventually destroyed on December 6, 1992. The act was carried out by Hindu militants who received support from the political organisation of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its sangh parivar, which represented the majority political group at the time. The violence that erupted across the subcontinent after the mosque's destruction resulted in a death toll of over 2,000 people (Johnson‐Roehr 2008). Later Stages and the Present Moving on to the 2000s, in 2002, the Allahabad High Court resumed hearings on the Babri-Ram Janmabhoomi property dispute. In 2003, the Supreme Court prohibited all religious activity on the obtained territory. They November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 229 invited the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) to conduct a thorough investigation through excavation at the site. With a 2:1 majority, the Allahabad High Court ruled in favor of a three-way division of the disputed area in 2010. The Sunni Waqf Board, the Nirmohi Akhara, and the Ram Lalla petitioners were to split the territory. The Supreme Court upheld the Allahabad HC’s verdict in 2011 (Outlook 2022). Eventually, as a result of the ruling government’s religious inclination towards Pro-Hindutva ideology, on November 9, 2019, the Supreme Court granted the god Ram Lalla complete ownership of the 2.77 acres of disputed land in Ayodhya, while simultaneously ruling that possession of the land shall remain with the central government receiver. The government as consolation also mandated to grant a 5-acre plot of land to Muslims in a prominent location for the construction of a mosque (Islam 2007). In present-day Indian law, deities are acknowledged as juristic persons. This recognition of legal personhood for deities can be traced back to British colonial law, which, in turn, drew upon indigenous legal traditions, albeit with differing degrees of success. Consequently, Indian deities have a legitimate basis for asserting their rights in the same forums as human devotees, utilizing the same representatives and adhering to the same legal principles (Das Acevedo 2023). The violent outbursts continued through the 2000s as well. The instances occurred in February 2002, when a group of 57 Hindu nationalists associated with the reconstruction of the Ayodhya temple were killed by Islamist arsonists who attacked the train they were traveling in. In July 2005, law enforcement officials eliminated five suspected Islamist gunmen after they exploded a bomb along the perimeter of the site, killing a guide who had previously been suspected of being a suicide bomber. The Indian government kept introducing new security measures, which were met with strong resistance from members of opposing Hindu and Islamic groups (Johnson‐Roehr 2008). The utilization of archaeological evidence to rationalize the loss of innocent lives in a highly charged communal context was deeply disturbing. In this particular incident, the evidence presented in court by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) almost served as a justification for the violence and destruction that had transpired. This was compounded by the court's failure to unequivocally 230 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 condemn these acts as morally wrong. The situation highlighted a harrowing instance where historical events were perceived as needing 'retribution' to redress present imbalances. Ultimately under the current government of India, which is very prominently pro-Hindu in all its dealings, the Ram Mandir construction has started on the site of the demolished Babri Masjid and should be completed in January 2024 according to ‘Ram Temple at Ayodhya to open from January 22: RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat’ (2023). The Archaeological Survey of India Report One of the integral points in the court case leading up to the final verdict by the Supreme Court in favour of the Hindus was the archaeological report submitted by the ASI (Archaeological Survey of India). The ASI is a central government body in India that is in charge of archaeological research as well as the conservation and preservation of cultural-historical monuments throughout the country. The Supreme Court invited the ASI to conduct an excavation in order to finally put to rest all the allegations and to ascertain whether there was evidence of a Hindu temple beneath the Mosque. Due to pressure from the judicial system, the excavation and subsequent report were made in such abysmal conditions that the introductory chapter of the report had an entire extra section titled ‘Constraints’ (Avikunthak 2021). The excavation was carried out under constant interference from the judiciary and representatives of the feuding parties overseeing the minute details of the excavation. This made the Ayodhya excavation the "ultimate bureaucratic circus," according to one informant from the ASI (Avikunthak 2021: 231). The constant vigilance and daily intrusion of various representatives were stressful, further aggravated by the national media reporting every potshard discovered (Avikunthak 2021). The central government and the judiciary forced the ASI to write the excavation report titled ‘Ayodhya: 2002–04—Excavations at the Disputed Site’ at a record-breaking time of 10 days. The most controversial inconsistency of the November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 231 text is the mysterious un-authored tenth chapter of the report, which provocatively and without much empirical basis asserted the presence of a temple under the disputed site. Each of the nine chapters has two or more authors, whereas the last chapter, unexpectedly and very suspiciously, had been written anonymously. This last chapter of the report is called ‘Summary of Results’ and is the most assertively interpretative section of the report. This chapter notes in the report that the monumental pillared structure found under the mosque was a temple. This assertion was usurped by the judges to adjudicate that a temple did exist under the Babri Masjid. The importance of this section can be judged by the fact that it has been cited twice in the Supreme Court judgment (Avikunthak 2021). Another significant shortfall is that the report was never published and thus remains inaccessible to the public. The hurried and forced nature of the task led to a report that would not stand well by any archaeological standard. The report read more as a testimony for the court rather than an actual piece of analytical work. (Avikunthak 2021). An Assistant Archaeologist at the ASI confided, “It is a good thing that report is not published, we are ourselves very embarrassed of it ” (Avikunthak 2021:234). This further portrays the ASI in a bad light as they can be seen as evil conspirators adding to the confusion and mayhem by withholding valuable information. Delving into the Complexities I have touched upon the bare bones of the case under the limited scale of this article. The exact emotions that strongly connect people to their history and make them react in extreme ways is an especially heavy challenge to unpack. But very exact combinations of history, politics, cultural understanding, and present economics have resulted in the above cases occurring. In the case of the Babri Masjid demolition, accusing fingers can be pointed in quite a few directions, from the ASI, the judicial system of India, and the 232 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 political parties vying for power within the country. The lasting effect of the divide-and-rule policy of the British colonial regime can also be accounted as a crucial factor amongst many other factors. All of these facets came together to create this very concerning situation. For ASI, if they could have been given more time to run a thorough investigation, maybe the results would have been different and if not at least the report would be published so that other people, historians, and archaeologists could speak up about any discrepancies. The conditions that led to the last anonymous chapter being added to the report which under any normal circumstance cannot be called a piece of scholarly writing but was used as an integral piece of evidence in one of the most historic court cases ever fought in India is a grave matter to be considered. The report could have been tampered with due to corruption within the ASI or even the people involved refusing to take accountability for writing that chapter due to a fear of repercussions from various sources. This exposes problems within the bureaucratic structure of the ASI’s proceedings and the overall ambiguity created by not publishing the report. This also could be a decision enforced by the government or any political entity that would profit from the obscurity of the facts. The responsibility is not just to be laid at the ASI. As an assistant archaeologist at the ASI said, “We came to the rescue of the court. This case needed a civil judgment, at worst a political judgment. The court instead decided on an archaeological judgment” (Avikunthak 2021: 229). The very premise of the excavation was absurd. The accuracy of the excavation results notwithstanding, the historicity of a monument, no matter how old or new, is not a judgment factor in whether it should stand in its place or not. The age of a monument does not spell out its importance. The whole argument of who came first is useless and will just create more antagonism. How far do we go back in history then? To only specify a singular religious identity to a site just negates the whole changing religious landscape of that particular place. Every place has its own fluid identity and nothing is rigid. The use of archaeology and its tools as an infallible science (the result of colonial archaeology leaving its marks on the ASI and its workings) for ‘hypothesis testing’ regardless of the essential contrast between folklore and fanaticism, the possibility of alterNovember 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 233 nate readings of the past is dismissed (Shaw 2000, Ray 2019). Archaeology cannot be considered as an infallible science due to various factors like such as incomplete evidence due to decay, destruction, and selective preservation; varying interpretations of the evidence found based on context and subjectivity, limited experimental opportunities etc. ‘On both sides of the Ayodhya argument, archaeology has "defeated itself through its own claims’, because in its quest for ‘facts,’ it has separated itself from the collective memory " (Thakurta 1997: 38). This kind of thinking was very evidently lacking from the judicial officials who in their stance to remain neutral and ‘true to real history’ thought this was the best pathway forward. The demolition of the mosque and the hundreds of lives lost in the conflict over the years were initially at least commonly considered to be a tragedy in the minds of the public. The recent government decision to build a new Rama temple on top of the Babri Masjid site is a direct contributor to this deliberate erasure of parts of history and gives importance to only certain parts of majoritarian perspectives. What could have been done to stop this? This erasure of parts of history, this negation of the fluidity of our culture, and the spread of hate among various sections within the society add to the oppression of minorities. People with the willingness to be aware of the social, religious, and political climate of the country seem to understand how the political abuse of history and culture affects the public but are also pessimistic about any improvement in further misuse of the communal narrative. Historians, archaeologists, anthropologists, sociologists, and any other professionals who deal with the history, culture, and identities of the people have very integral parts to play in circumstances like these. But as we go ahead with our ‘pieces of evidence’ to try and curb any information that seems inaccurate and could provide to be dangerous, the intention behind it could be considered admirable but the question remains whether we or rather anybody is qualified to tell others that the stories and culture that their society and identity is based on, is false and thus is of no value? 234 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 In this situation, the most viable resolution to this issue appears to lie in abstaining from making judgments based on historical authenticity or attempting to assign varying degrees of significance to different historical facets. Instead, it is imperative to maintain a steadfast commitment to the principle that regardless of the historical accuracy or legitimacy, one's history and culture should never be wielded as instruments to inflict harm upon the lives, histories, and cultures of others. We learn of our past not to repeat it but in order to learn from our past mistakes. There is no moving forward as a society, country, or human beings if we cannot give due and equal respect to all of our pasts. This is definitely an idealistic notion but that does not mean we should not try to strive towards a semblance of it. Unfortunately, there has been a gradual progression since even before the independence of the country towards a specific narrative which has become glaringly clear with the current government’s policies and their bent towards ‘Hindutva’. ‘Hindutva’ as a political ideology (in the simplest of terms can be defined as Hindu nationalism, ideology of the Hindu right, represented by the political party Bharatiya Janata Party) (Sharma 2020), seems to be gaining a forefront in the country where there is a conscious effort in actively returning to and re-evaluating the past anew in a way that would suit their political needs. The act of collective forgetting, perpetuated by specific narratives, stands as a fundamental component of collective memory, as argued by Harrison (2012). This phenomenon holds profound implications for the preservation and treatment of a nation's heritage in contrast to the heritage of its diverse populace. India, characterized by a rich tapestry of cultures, societies, religions, and identities, is a reality that must not merely exist as ink on constitutional pages but should be embraced and celebrated fervently. The current governmental approach towards Indian heritage, ostensibly aimed at constructing a unified national narrative, inadvertently leads to the marginalization and obliteration of minority perspectives. This assertion underscores the pressing need for a nuanced understanding of the complexities intrinsic to India's pluralistic heritage, advocating for a more inclusive and comprehensive approach that recognizes and cherishes the diverse cultural mosaic that defines the nation. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 235 The archaeology of India would benefit from the ASI not being controlled only by the central government as it results in only certain parts of the country being focused on and the others falling into ruin. One of the viable solutions to his problem would be decentralization of archaeology institutes. By allowing states to control their own narratives, the proposal aims to mitigate the influence of centralized political powers on historical interpretations. Localized control can reduce the manipulation of historical facts to suit political agendas, fostering a more authentic representation of the region's history. India boasts a rich tapestry of cultures, languages, and traditions. Allowing states to shape their own narratives ensures that the diverse cultural heritage of each region is acknowledged and preserved. This approach counters the tendency of a singular national narrative that might overlook or oversimplify the unique histories of various states and communities. It could also potentially reduce tensions arising from communal and ethnic differences. When communities have agency in representing their own histories, it might promote understanding and tolerance among diverse groups, fostering social cohesion. This can empower local communities and instil a sense of pride in their heritage, fostering a more inclusive national identity that appreciates the mosaic of regional cultures. Such a system by spreading out the responsibility for conservation and protection of monuments and sites, can ensure more equitable distribution of resources. This can address historical imbalances where certain regions received disproportionate attention and funding for preservation efforts. Local control can foster academic freedom and diverse perspectives in historical research. Scholars and researchers in different states can explore their regional histories without the constraints of a uniform, centrally imposed narrative, leading to a more comprehensive understanding of India's past. However, it's essential to recognize that while decentralization has its advantages, it also requires careful coordination to maintain a cohesive national historical identity. Balancing regional autonomy with a shared sense of national heritage is crucial to ensuring that the proposal effectively addresses the challenges of the politicization of history in India. 236 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 Conclusion The involvement of publics and their knowledge in regard to the archaeology of their culture and country is an integral factor in helping curb the misuse and abuse of historic events. The case study I have used here is negative in nature but the discipline of archaeology was originally constructed to do the complete opposite. Even now through the help of public archaeology scholars have been trying to bridge this gap between actual historic events and the cultural memory that is connected to the same material. The enduring presence of unscrupulous individuals seeking to exploit public sentiments regarding their historical identity remains a regrettable reality. Through the examination of both case studies, it becomes unmistakably clear that these emotions wield significant influence, mobilizing disparate segments of society and serving as tools for acquiring power and dominance, often at the expense of minority populations who are oppressed through various means. The intense emotions linked to the public's historical heritage constitute a profoundly complex subject, yet one that is repeatedly manipulated to further specific agendas. Addressing this issue necessitates a multifaceted approach. The most viable solution lies in enhancing public awareness regarding these manipulative tactics and fostering engagement in archaeological endeavours. By empowering the public with knowledge and critical thinking skills, individuals can become vigilant against manipulative narratives and recognize attempts to exploit their historical sentiments for nefarious purposes. Active engagement in archaeological pursuits can promote a deeper understanding of the complexities of history, fostering a more nuanced and informed perspective. In this manner, society can guard against the divisive forces that seek to exploit historical emotions and work towards a more inclusive and empathetic future, where historical identity is respected and understood without being weaponized for oppressive agendas. November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 237 Acknowledgements Many thanks are due to my supervisor Professor Cameron Petrie without whose guidance and support this project would not have been possible. Thanks also to Dr Meg Westbury who always ordered for me the reference books I needed. I am also very grateful to Jack Kwock, Manogya Sahay, Maria Fernanda, Javier Sandovaal, Andres Alfonso and Hannane Kanan along with my parents for their encouragement and support. 238 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2 References Avikunthak, A. 2021. “The Absent Excavation Reports,” in Bureaucratic Archaeology: State, Science, and Past in Postcolonial India. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (South Asia in the Social Sciences), pp. 227–258. doi: 10.1017/9781009067119.011. [Babri Masjid, Faizabad]. Albumen print, Getty Museum. Public domain photograph. PICRYL - Public Domain Media Search Engine Public Domain Image (2023). Available at: https://garystockbridge617.getarchive.net/amp/media/babri-masjid-faizabad-725b2c. BBC. 2018. “Padmaavat: Why a Bollywood epic has sparked fierce protests,” BBC, 21 November. Available at: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-42048512 (Accessed: April 19, 2023). Datta, R. 2017. Rani Padmini: A classic case of how lore was inserted into history, The Wire. Available at: https://thewire.in/books/rani-padmini-classic-case-lore-inserted-history (Accessed: April 18, 2023). Harrison, R. 2013 Heritage: Critical Approaches. Milton Park, Abingdon ; New York: Routledge. Islam, A. 2007. “Babri mosque: A historic bone of contention,” Muslim world (Hartford, Conn.), 97(2), pp. 259–286. doi: 10.1111/j.1478-1913.2007.00173.x. Johnson-Roehr, S. 2008. “The archaeological survey of India and communal violence in post‐independence India,” International journal of heritage studies, 14(6), pp. 506–523. doi: 10.1080/13527250802503266. Sharma, A. 2020, “On the Difference between Hinduism and Hindutva.” Asian Philosophies and Religions, www.asianstudies.org/publications/eaa/archives/on-the-difference-between-hinduism-and-hindutva/. Accessed 20 Sept. 2023. Outlook India. 2022. Outlookindia.com. Available at: https://www.outlookindia.com/national/babri-masjid-demolition-a-timeline-of-the-ram-janmabhoomi-dispute-case-news-220247 (Accessed: April 15, 2023). Padmini Palace Chittorgarh | History, Best Time & How To Reach (no date). Available at: https://www.holidify.com/places/chittorgarh/padmini-palace-sightseeing-121013.html. Ray, H. P. 2019. “Legislation and the study of the past: The archaeological survey of India and challenges of the present,” in Gorshenina, S. et al. (eds.) “Masters” and “Natives.” Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, pp. 197–212. Shaw, J. 2000. “Ayodhya’s sacred landscape: ritual memory, politics and archaeological ‘fact,’” Antiquity, 74(285), pp. 693–700. doi: 10.1017/s0003598x00060087. Sreenivasan, R. 2017. The many lives of a Rajput queen: Heroic pasts in India, C. 1500-1900. University of Washington Press, pp. 22-64, 118-156 Thakurta, T.G. 1997. Archaeology as evidence: Looking back from the Ayodhya debate. Calcutta: Centre for Studies in Social Sciences November 2023 / Archaeology and the Publics 239 Forthcoming Issue Volume 39.1: Human-Insect Entanglement: Past, Present, and Future Edited by Nynke Blömer, Benny Q. Shen and Jake Stone Despite insects being the most diverse and numerous group of animals, their roles in human societies in the past, present, and future have been largely underrepresented in the archaeological and heritage disciplines, often due to Western biases that have regarded insects as pests. Archaeoentomological approaches developed from the late 1970s have demonstrated great potential but predominantly treated insects as passive environmental proxies. The recent 'animal turn' within post-humanist anthropology has urged researchers to reexamine the relationships between humans and non-human animals, including insects. This paradigm shift has prompted a more focused exploration of the cultural aspects of human-insect interactions, such as apiculture, sericulture, and the ritual importance of termites in sub-Saharan Africa. This volume seeks to bridge these two streams of research by highlighting insects as active agents in shaping human-insect co-history through interdisciplinary perspectives by bringing together fields like archaeology, entomology, palaeoecology, anthropology, and history of science. Additionally, the volume underscores the importance of studying human-insect interactions in underrepresented regions, such as Africa, Asia, Oceania, and South America. Ultimately, the volume aims to provide a deeper understanding of how insects have played a dynamic role in shaping human societies, shedding light on both the past and potential future relationships between humans and the natural world in an era of environmental emergencies. 240 Archaeological Review from Cambridge / Vol 38.2

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