Memory in Community-Based Archaeology

Part of: Society for Historical Archaeology 2018

Recent applications of community-based archaeology have engaged with various stakeholders from descendants to local members of the community, all with varying investment in the archaeological practice. The papers presented in this session focus on community-based archaeology as a theory and methodology that adds to the analysis of collective memory. Specifically viewing archaeology as craft (Gonzalez-Ruibal 2013), the papers explore how archaeology as both metaphor and practice allow for the excavation of memory through an engagement with materiality, temporality, and lieux de memoire (Nora 1989). Exploring the complex relationship of intersectionality to memory work (Mills and Walker 2008), presenters seek to engage the way community-based archaeology entangles with various processes of meaning making, commemoration, preservation, and education at archaeological sites. Using an interdisciplinary approach, presenters will tie in ethnographic archaeologies, oral history, archival research, and "dirt archaeology" to explore the relationship between memory and the archaeological praxis.

Other Keywords
Memory • heritage • Landscape • Identity • Materiality • Community-based Research • Community-Based Participatory Research • Collective memory • Israel/Palestine

Temporal Keywords
Nineteenth Century • 19th century to the present • Contemporary/ 1800s

Geographic Keywords
North America • Coahuila (State / Territory) • New Mexico (State / Territory) • Oklahoma (State / Territory) • Arizona (State / Territory) • Texas (State / Territory) • Sonora (State / Territory) • United States of America (Country) • Chihuahua (State / Territory) • Nuevo Leon (State / Territory)

Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-4 of 4)

  • Documents (4)
Documents
  • Archaeological Impacts on Collective Memory: Re-creating a Mayan Identity? (2018)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Kasey Diserens Morgan.

    If collective memory "requires the support of a group delimited in space and time," (Halbwachs 1992) how does archaeological work engaging local communities impact the memory of historical events? As scholars interested in the indigenous rebellion known as the Caste War (1847-1901) in Tihosuco, Mexico, we are often told by members of the local community who repopulated the area eighty years ago that we know more about the history of the uprising than they do. This paper seeks to explore three...

  • Community-Based Archaeology in the Bahamas: Linking Landscape and Memory (2018)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Elena Sesma.

    In 1871, the last owner of the Millars Plantation Estate on Eleuthera, Bahamas left a portion of the former plantation acreage to the descendants of her former slaves and servants. In the intervening 175 years since emancipation in the Bahamas and the 125 years since the property transferred to "generation land", south Eleuthera has experienced a series of economic transformations and demographic transitions. Despite these changes, the Millars descendant community maintains their connection to...

  • Displacement, Memory, and Community Heritage Work in the Old City of Acre (Israel) (2018)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Evan P. Taylor.

    In 2001, the Old City of Acre, a Palestinian quarter of the mixed Jewish-Palestinian municipality of Acre in northern Israel, was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site and state projects are underway to transform the Crusader and Ottoman-era landscape into a tourist attraction. This research asks how residents, most of whom belong to internally displaced families of 1948, are navigating the state heritage project. Memories of displacement  and of the relative safety and autonomy found in the...

  • Ethnography in the Unit: Archaeology As Elicitation (2018)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Marc Lorenc.

    Ethnographic approaches to archaeology have explored the way in which archaeological projects are themselves a fruitful site of study (Castenada and Matthews 2008; Hamilakis and Anagnostopoulos 2009). This paper will build on these approaches to explore how Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) archaeological projects open up a rich space for ethnographic inquiry. The paper develops a methodology that uses archaeology both as a craft and metaphor (Gonzalez-Ruibal 2013) in order to elicit...