Community archaeology, participation, and building in public
Then
In late 2010, Claire Casey was beginning Paisley’s Past, a proposed three-year community archaeology project in Scotland. Rather than wait until the project was finished, she agreed to document its development through Voices while the questions, partnerships, funding needs, and public-engagement plans were still unresolved.
Contribution
Claire brought a work-in-progress model into the archive. Her contribution was not a polished success story but the practical process of trying to create inclusive community archaeology: local people participating in surveying, excavation, post-excavation, oral history, interpretation, and the future of their town.
What she tried
She built a project team, pursued organizational support and funding, created a Facebook presence, planned public meetings and press outreach, and explicitly invited the wider Voices community to contribute ideas and experience.
What happened
The project became a recurring case study on Voices, allowing readers to see how community heritage work develops through relationships, practical constraints, and repeated decisions rather than appearing fully formed.
What remains
Participation becomes meaningful when communities are invited into the work itself, not only into the audience. Documenting that process while it is happening also turns uncertainty into useful knowledge for other practitioners.
Appearances in Voices
- 2010 — Bringing Paisley’s Past into the 21st Century with community archaeology
- 2011 — Paisley’s Past, Part II
Related critical questions
- Who gets to speak, and whose knowledge is heard?
- How do we make knowledge more accessible without losing its meaning?
Related Voices
Josh Stull · Tony Cagle · David Connolly · Maggie Struckmeier · Rolonda Teal
Revisit this Voice
A revisit could ask what ultimately happened to Paisley’s Past and what the original planning record teaches about community archaeology after years of hindsight.