From Place to Landscape in Heritage Discourse
Channel: Recording Archaeology
Date: 2019-04-09

Much recent and extremely welcome work on minority heritage has emphasised issues of identity associated with particular historic places. However, as the session abstract indicates, linking heritage to identity can lead to exclusion and contested values. This paper argues for a complementary approach to shared heritage that lays greater emphasis on larger scales of space and time. Proceeding from a critique of some of the terms used in heritage discourse, especially the identity-laden concept of ‘place’, and of the emphasis on relatively recent history, I suggest we also need to attend to ideas of ‘landscape’ and ‘deep time’, which foreground archaeological narratives and can be presented more accessibly, in terms of environmental and social issues that are common to us all. 

Jonathan Last (Historic England)