- Convenors:
-
Sophie Elpers
(University of Antwerp and Meertens Institute, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences)
Roger Norum (University of Oulu)
Marianne de Laet (KNAW Meertens Institute)
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- Format:
- Panel
Short Abstract
The panel invites reflections on how citizen science can contribute to the democratisation of the contents of heritage collections and archives and the surrounding practices, thereby enhancing public access, engagement and ownership.
Description
This panel focuses on inclusive co-creative methods for heritage collection and research — including the co-creation of heritage itself and the reflection on historical practices of citizen engagement in our fields. If citizen science challenges the institutionalised ‘authorised heritage discourse' (Smith), engages communities and individuals, and amplifies underrepresented or unheard voices in the heritage field, here we seek to showcase and explore best practices for doing so.
How can citizen science contribute to the democratisation of the contents of collections and archives, and so enhance public access, engagement and ownership? How can public engagement inform decisions about what to collect? How do inclusive strategies for generating data and archives foster new collecting practices? How can data description and archival access be co-produced? How can citizen science inform research questions for collections and archives? What collaborative models, both within and beyond heritage institutions, can we think up? What kinds of organisational structures are needed to enable citizen science in heritage collection and research institutions?
Finally, we wish to turn to the histories of our own disciplines (heritage studies, ethnology, folklore, anthropology, history, and neighboring fields), where citizens routinely assisted in gathering information about everyday life. These histories present their own opportunities, challenges and pitfalls, and we are faced with the question of how to make meaningful use of the materials we collected in the past. Can citizen science help in this regard?
We welcome papers offering theoretical reflections, presenting practical examples and sharing lessons learned from past and ongoing projects.
Accepted papers
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Short Abstract
In this presentation we introduce and explore the concept of Heritage Practice Communities (HPCs). HPCs may create and share knowledge independently of formal institutions, which can seem at odds with many citizen science models that are conventionally shaped and controlled by heritage institutions.
Abstract
In this presentation we introduce and explore the concept of Heritage Practice Communities (HPCs). This is a term which is intended to assist researchers and others with making sense of how diverse groups engage with heritage, beyond formal, institutional frameworks.
Public participation, including through citizen science, is often shaped by top-down models that can primarily serve, or originate from heritage institutions. Academic research on HPCs has also commonly aimed at providing training or instruction, or otherwise modifying, correcting or harnessing the ways in which the public uses, accesses and works with heritage. We contend that across society, many groups exist that independently create and share heritage knowledge. The goals and interests of these HPCs may sometimes be in alignment with, or be influenced by, the goals and interests of heritage institutions. At other times, however, their interests and ways of generating knowledge may differ from and even be at odds with those of heritage institutions.
We explore what it means to study, engage with and co-create with HPCs, suggesting that in a metaphorical ‘galaxy’ of heritage actors and activities, HPCs, institutions, and other actors form dynamic, ever-shifting constellations, capturing the fluidity of these relationships. We conclude with a call for a shift away from institutional perspectives on heritage practices and communities. We aim in this way to support more respectful, engagements from both researchers and heritage professionals, not just viewing non-professionals through their usefulness to institutions, but recognizing them as equal stakeholders around a shared object of interest, with autonomy and intrinsic value.
Short Abstract
Who decides what is remembered? This non-extractive citizen science framework returns that choice to communities. AI synthesizes diverse materials; people control what enters, how it is described, and who can access it. Outputs meet archival and policy standards while contributors retain control.
Abstract
Heritage democratization begins with a fundamental question: who decides what is remembered? Our answer is simple: the people who live the stories.
This conceptual framework for audience-aligned narrative design challenges the traditional expert-led model, which gives professionals the final say and returns decision-making rights to communities. Community sovereignty is the foundation. Technology is designed to follow it.
AI serves as memory, mirror, co-creator, and facilitator by synthesizing interview transcripts, historical information, photos, and relevant data into traceable narrative units. Communities direct the process, choosing what enters synthesis, how it is described, which connections are considered, and who may access the outputs. Sovereignty is enforced through OCAP and CARE principles, with consent states and provenance logs governing every use. Nothing leaves without recorded approval.
In practice, community members trained in citizen science methods direct this synthesis. This expertise eliminates the need for expert intermediaries. Communities deliver archive-ready materials on their own terms: finding aids and machine-readable provenance that align with archival and policy formats. A single synthesis can produce multiple outputs, such as finding aids for archives, briefs for policymakers, lessons for educators, and stories for local media, with community control maintained throughout the process.
This approach transforms both people and systems. The authorship process cultivates durable stewards, enhances narrative agency, deepens connection to place, and fosters intergenerational belonging. When communities control their stories, they control their futures.
Short Abstract
The presentation discusses the inception of a citizen science project with Surinamese heritage data, focusing on how to establish co-creation, shared authority, and methodological transparency from the outset within a postcolonial and institutional research setting.
Abstract
This presentation reflects methodologically on the early phase of a citizen science project grounded in the Suriname Time Machine (https://www.huygens.knaw.nl/en/projecten/suriname-time-machine/) and the Historical Database of Suriname and the Caribbean (https://www.ru.nl/en/research/research-projects/historical-database-suriname-and-the-caribbean). Starting in December 2025, the project seeks to reframe citizen participation from data contribution towards shared authority in heritage research. Central questions include how existing heritage data can be made more accessible, which collections and datasets should be added, and how narratives can be shaped and presented to reflect both institutional and community perspectives. A particular focus lies on connecting archival materials to personal and collective histories that hold significance within Surinamese communities.
At this stage, the project structure remains open by design, allowing co-creation to inform its development before objectives become fixed. The process raises critical questions about identifying and involving Surinamese diaspora communities in the Netherlands, distributing decision-making power between researchers and community managers, and avoiding the reproduction of colonial hierarchies within participatory frameworks. Initial experiences from these preparatory stages will be presented at the conference.
Methodological transparency forms the foundation of this work. Reflexivity and awareness of positionality and institutional constraints are treated as integral to research design, communication, and accessibility. Rather than presenting results, the presentation examines the uncertainties, negotiations, and groundwork involved in building co-created citizen science from the beginning. It invites discussion on how participatory heritage research can move beyond consultation towards genuinely community-directed practice.
Short Abstract
Through co-creation, the Next Generation Lab engages high school students in ZooMS analysis of Medieval Danish artefacts, generating taxonomic data that reveal material choices and cultural dissonance related to the use of horsehides in Medieval and Renaissance Copenhagen.
Abstract
Developer-led urban excavations generate more archaeological material than museums can effectively store, conserve, or analyse. The citizen science project Next Generation Lab (NGL), in a co-creation approach with Danish museums and high school teachers, addresses this challenge by transforming underutilised heritage collections into educational and scientific resources. Since 2021, approx. 3,000 high school students have participated in one-day workshops where they process Medieval and Renaissance leather and bone artefacts using ZooArchaeology by Mass Spectrometry (ZooMS). The workflow is designed to engage mainly high schoolers in authentic research aligned with school curricula, ensuring both meaningful learning and robust scientific outcomes. To date, NGL has produced over 4,000 taxonomic identifications, accumulating big data. A key case study examines the complex role of horses in Scandinavian Medieval and Renaissance societies. Despite Christian prohibitions against horse meat and social stigma surrounding horsehide work, ZooMS analyses of approx. 1,000 artefacts from Copenhagen reveal an unexpectedly high number of Equus sp. identifications. This suggests a dissonance between aspirational norms and material practices, offering new insights into resource use and craft traditions. By engaging students directly in the production of scientific knowledge, NGL demonstrates how citizen science can democratise archaeological research. It opens collections to public participation, fosters critical engagement with the past, and transforms dormant materials into shared resources that enhance access, collaboration, and collective ownership of cultural heritage.
Short Abstract
SAMMEN FF is a national network of Norwegian cultural history museums dedicated to advancing citizen science through collaboration, participatory methodologies, and public engagement. This paper seeks to expand our discussions about the implementation of citizen science in cultural history museums.
Abstract
SAMMEN FF is a national network initiative for Norwegian cultural history museums focused on strengthening citizen science, collaborative practices and public engagement. Norwegian museums have a longstanding tradition of working closely with volunteers and local communities, and the network aims to raise awareness of such existing citizen science practices and foster self-reflexiveness, theoretical and methodological knowledge and innovation in participatory research.
Launched in 2024 by the Museum of Cultural History (University of Oslo), Østfoldmuseene, and Stiftelsen Norsk Folkemuseum, with funding from the Research Council of Norway, the SAMMEN FF network explores how museums with regional and national responsibilities can employ citizen science to foster local ownership to and relevance in museum knowledge production. Practical efforts to this end include collaborations with Saami organisations in Oslo, avocational metal detectorists, coastal heritage associations and participants in a national food memory collection.
In the years to come, we wish to expand the established platform for professional dialogue and development beyond national borders. The present paper aims to initiate such a discussion about how citizen science complements or challenges conventional research methodologies in cultural history museums and heritage institutions in the Norwegian context and beyond.
Short Abstract
Maritime Archaeological Society established an ambitious research program of creating a 3D ontology of all historic shipwrecks in the Baltic Sea. Within few years MAS volunteers gathered the world's largest collection of "digital twins" of shipwrecks, sparking lot of subsequent academic research.
Abstract
The focus and balance of the presentation will be adjusted with the panel leaders to align with alike presentations. The presentation must of course present the context (underwater cultural heritage), actors (MAS, universities, Heritage Agency) and the program's (Baltic Sea 3D Wrecksite Ontology) strategy and operations, but thereafter the balance between the substance and process to deliver it could shift towards the latter, discussing how it was achieved and what where the ciritical components thereto. Finally the presentation would live upto it's title and describe the international accreditation and awards it has reached, as well as the subsequent research projects and co-operation with Global palyers like UNESCO and University of East Carolina. If timing allows, we could describe in short how it all even affected the Finland's ratification of UN frame agreement for the protection of underwater cultural heritage.
Short Abstract
This paper explores the ways bioartists repurpose historical buildings and ruins into artistic spaces and works, creating heritage in and of spaces and places long forgotten or ignored.
Abstract
Bioartists are a unique form of citizen scientists who work to democratize knowledge production and claims to knowledge about both nature and culture in unique and collaborative ways. From collective permafrost walks to collecting microbes in nuclear power plants, a growing contingent of bioart today focuses on reclaiming both natural and infrastructural ruins as a method of cultivating and archiving heritage. Heritage here is decidedly open, indexing both national and planetary ruins as bioartists are not always bounded by or to one specific cultural formation. Indeed, these bioartistic citizen scientists are generating heritage in spaces and places often forgotten or ignored, including nuclear power plants, prisons, and military bunkers. Mobilizing empirical cases of bioartists repurposing historical ruins for bioartistic purposes, this paper explores the ways bioart as a citizen science can contribute to building heritage archives from out of the way and oft-forgotten places and spaces, ruins overtaken by nature. In particular, this paper will demonstrate how the act of ruination transforms the out of the way places and spaces into nature-cultures, such that what is then salvaged and repurposed by bioartists is a hybrid of heritage that embodies the socialization of nature and the naturalization of culture. I will also illustrate how bioart as a practice is often predicated on collaborations between bioartists and communities in ways that compare to anthropology. I therefore argue that bioart might inspire anthropological theory and methods as a collaborative citizen science that attends to the manifestation and subsequent archiving of heritage as nature-cultures.