Paper short abstract:

The development process can often involve changing the places that people live - and with it their identification with a historic landscape. In extreme cases, this may involve the actual removal of whole communities. Such developments can involve organised and often mass local protest. The paper will examine three case studies - the Totnes pumping station, the Lewis Windfarm and the Heathrow third runway and sixth terminal. In each, archaeology has an important role in the protest movement; in two cases, the eventual outcome.

Paper long abstract:

Archaeology is often portrayed in rather sterile terms of past that is distant and remote from everyday communities. That past suddenly comes to life, when communities are threatened - often in the development process. Mass grass roots protest movements grow up in response to such threats to the way of life, their landscapes around them or indeed in extreme cases, the actual right to continue to live in these places. Preserving that past then becomes a weapon in the fight to stop the proposals, and often a deeply emotional attachment is felt to historic places and features in the landscape. The 'past' is often not a past that is valued by the academy as places to preserve of national importance, but are local and often very contemporary in nature. Heritage organisations will often not support these communities in their fight to save the local, because they feel they only have a national remit. Ironically it is often government has listened to these local arguments in making the final decisions. In the new field of contemporary archaeology, this past is particularly valued at the local level as something that is remembered and which actually matters. The paper will look at three campaigns - the Totnes Pumping Station, the Lewis Wind Farm and third runway /sixth terminal at Heathrow - to examine the link between a community's sense of identity and its place in the historic landscape.