Theme:
3. The Life of Archaeological Heritage in Society
Session format:
Regular session
Title:
Decision-making and Assessing and Articulating Archaeological Significance
Content:
The Europae Archaeologiae Consilium (EAC) has done extensive work on assessing and articulating significance. Significance is a primary consideration in heritage management and informs decisions about what will be considered an archaeological heritage resource worthy of protection, conservation, and management. By summing up specific values, significance gives a statement about why a site or a monument should be the subject of preservation and conservation (or not) and guides management action. The assessment of significance is thus a key tool which shapes the material archaeological record, and forms a basis for subsequent actions and interactions with archaeological heritage.
Significance itself is a dynamic concept that changes over time. Significance places relative values on the material record and is by its very nature subjective. Archaeological heritage benefits society in many different ways, and assessing significance should take into account a wide range of different values. It should be a reflective and critical process that allows more voices to be heard.
These developing considerations operate within international, national and regional legislative frameworks that may not accommodate these multiple voices, and in the face of many economic, societal and other pressures on archaeological heritage. The huge growth in techniques available to detect, record and interpret individual sites and monuments and wider archaeological landscapes also presents data-based challenges to heritage management agencies and all archaeologists charged with assessing archaeological significance.
The complex process of assesing archaeological significance provides the foundation for all decision-making in heritage management. Understanding and exploring it is vital to questions such as why we preserve archaeology, how we articulate the relationship between past and present, and how archaeological heritage can benefit society.
Aim of the session is to share the EAC results and to share experiences and good examples. We invite speakers to present their own research regarding this theme.
Keywords:
significance, heritage management, decision-making
Session associated with MERC:
no
Session associated with CIfA:
no
Session associated with SAfA:
no
Session associated with CAA:
no
Session associated with DGUF:
no
Session associated with other:
European Archaeological Council (EAC)
Main organiser:
Marjolein Verschuur (Netherlands) 1,2
Co-organisers:
Thor Hjaltalin (Iceland) 3,2
Affiliations:
1. Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands
2. European Archaeological Council
3. The Cultural Heritage Agency of Iceland
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