Value of culture and heritage

[Laurie Sommers]

https://advisor.museumsandheritage.com/news/six-research-projects-to-measure-value-of-culture-and-heritage-to-society/ 

Jeremy Wells posted this on LinkedIn wirh the question "Why isn't  this being done in the US?"

Good question!

Anyone know of any studies?

[Margaret Magat]

Hi Laurie,

The Getty Center did a series of reports to assess the value of cultural heritage. There is a 2002 pdf of the report. I don't know if there is a more recent one. https://www.getty.edu/conservation/publications_resources/pdf_publications/values_cultural_heritage.html

Glad they are doing that study in Great Britain! 

Best,

Margaret 

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[Jeremy Wells]

There’s an important and not widely known story about the Getty Center’s work on heritage values around the turn of this century. The two main players in this research — Randy Mason (now at UPenn) and Erica Avrami (now at Columbia U) — left the Getty, in part, because by around 2002, the leadership there disowned their investment in this line of inquiry and, instead, doubled down on materials science and high-tech physical documentation methods. By the time SurveyLA came around (about 2008), which was primarily funded by the Getty, there wasn’t a shred of Avrami's and Mason’s research and recommendations present in its implementation. What a shame.

Interestingly, the Values and Heritage Conservation publication from 2000 remains one of the most widely downloaded books from the Getty Center — like somewhere in the 10s of thousands, which is shockingly large for this rather small field. This publication is the primary reason why Avrami’s and Mason’s h index scores are some of the highest among heritage scholars. And — not surprisingly — most of the downloads are from Europe and not the US. If you look at who cites this publication the most, again, it’s Europeans and not people from the US.

I originally pursued a PhD because I came across Values and Heritage Conservation and was driven to understand these social dimensions of heritage through a social science lens. But, I was also driven by the idea that research and empirical evidence could help change preservation practice and policy to be more responsive to the public. The wonderful faculty at Clemson University helped me put together a unique set of courses where I learned all of the most common qualitative and quantitative research methods. I then started to be an advocate for the social sciences in theory and practice in historic preservation.

Now, about two decades later, I have given up. I learned too late that the leaders in the preservation field aren’t interested in this perspective. I had a chance to take a position as a lecturer in an English university in 2018, but in the midst of Brexit and concerns over my family’s adjustment to living overseas, I did not accept it. Instead I went to an R-1 here in Maryland with the hopes that my research would be supported. Unfortunately, it was not. The faculty in the program were either naive or, more troubling, hostile to the idea of people-centered preservation and taunted me, continually, about my research and practice interests. I grew so tired of hearing a senior professor say “you’re too focused on people and not enough on fabric.” When my institution granted me tenure, I was told that my record was exemplary except that I focused too much on people and not enough on fabric—in confidence, someone let it leak that some of my external evaluator’s letters said the exact same thing. I even had a professor from an R-1 in Texas send me a paper letter saying that I needed to stop focusing so much on people and the social sciences and that we need to “go back to the ways we used to do things.”

I am so tired of this.

In the end, the faculty in my program at my former institution pushed me out by creating a hostile work environment. (I should note that the faculty in the other programs in my school were very much in support of me—especially from planning.) My Dean offered zero support. The “solution” was to wait for people to retire. I am still suffering from the physical and mental consequences of this damage. But, in the end, my family supported me and my institution betrayed me. I will not go back to being a professor in the US, which is probably rather easy because there’s next to no opportunities in the US for my work. There is genuine evil in this world. I am no longer naive. 

As I alluded to in my LinkedIn post, this line of inquiry (the social value of heritage — i.e., beyond just economic value) pretty much died in the US two decades ago, but has continued to be supported with research funding in Europe by a variety of governmental agencies. (I had a post on this on my now discontinued blog, but I can go back to my records if anyone is interested in who these agencies are.) In the US, Mason dropped his research in values-centered preservation by the mid naughts; only Avrami has kept this line of research alive, which is fantastic, but she is also in a tremendously lonely and vulnerable place.

I was greatly heartened to see around 2018 or so, the National Trust embraced the idea of “people centered” preservation. I worked with David Brown and Tom Mayes (great people) on some of the ideas that eventually found their way into the Trust’s position paper. But, since then, what I have seen is the Trust and other preservation organizations take the emancipatory ideas of people-centered preservation and only apply them within the context of marginalized groups, but not the broader swath of humanity. To be sure, the preservation field has long ignored the values and perspectives of groups with marginalized racial and ethnic identities and this switch in focus is sorely needed (those of you who know me probably realize that a lot of my research and publications focused in this particular area). But, in 2023, the broader promise of people-centered preservation has somehow been lost in the US. And, most importantly, it’s never been used as an instrument for helping to change policy. I was so disheartened in a recent conversation with the current chair of the ACHP, who otherwise is a tremendously positive force for change in the field, to learn that she knows next to nothing about this area of research and its association with needed policy change. I really, really hope that the appointment of Avrami to the ACHP’s new advisory group might be an opportunity to sway the hearts and minds of its leadership toward this area.

Since I walked away from my tenured position, I am increasingly distressed that PhD students are reaching out to me now because they also see the blatant nihilism in the historic preservation field and are genuinely scared. Like me, they have an interest in the connections between the social sciences and preservation policy; and, like me, they keep running into hostility and abuse. When I talk with them, I am honest with my experiences, but try to offer hope that other disciplines (e.g., planning, museum studies) are more likely to be receptive to their research interests. What would you say to them?

Right now, I have a book contract and a completed manuscript in the hands of the U Press of Tennessee. The book is tentatively titled "Crafting People- and Human-Centered Historic Preservation Policy to Manage the Magic of Old Places.” I’m waiting, now, for the inevitable brutality of the peer reviewers’ comments. If you were me, would you bother completing it? Who would care enough to bother to read it? I just don’t feel that this is a wise use of my time.

Remember to take care of your physical and especially mental health. Staying in a toxic and abusive workplace (and field!) is not worth the damage it can cause you. Leave before it consumes you and your soul.

-Jeremy

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[Gregory Hansen]

Thanks for posting, Margaret, Laurie, and Jeremy.

 

I wanted to mention that rather than going through university presses, there are other presses that are publishing interesting work on heritage and related interests. I’ve used books by Routledge, Sage, and Left Coast Press in my classes. They might be interested in new manuscripts on Historic Preservation.

 

- Gregory

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[Jeremy Wells]

Greg — thank you. You’re spot on with the other presses, especially Routledge, as the peer review process isn’t, shall we say, as “nitpicky.” A few years ago, the U of TN press sent out my book prospectus, which included three completed chapters, to three peer reviewers who did, with varying degrees of enthusiasm and conditions, recommend the press accept the book for publication, pending further peer review on the chapters to be completed (it’s this last stage where I’m at, now). Technically, as I have a contract with the press, they’d need to release me from it before I could take the book to another press.

I still clearly remember one peer reviewer writing how “offensive” it was that I referred to influential historical leaders in the field as “white,” especially when the actions being described were clearly discriminatory against people with minoritized identities. Thankfully, the editor looked past that, but the number of these far-right comments I get from peer reviewers is so demoralizing. I expect more pushback like this when the last peer review comments arrive.

-Jeremy 

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