Phase 1:

Heritage Lincolnshire are leading one project piloting ways to engage diverse communities using the past for Historic England and Historic Environment Scotland. The pilot project is called Outreach to Ownership and was funded by the Art s and Humanities Research Council. Heritage Lincolnshire worked with partners at Nottingham Trent University to develop Building on History.

The Heritage Lincolnshire project was to develop a digital tool to enable communities to recognise the value of diverse stories through designation or plaques. The tool was then tested through under-represented communities in Lincolnshire and Nottingham.

The project website including the digital tool for engage with communities about recognising diverse types of heritage is available here: Building on History Project Website

Phase 1 of the project is discussed in Historic England's Research publication here: https://historicengland.org.uk/whats-new/research/back-issues/outreach-to-ownership-a-community-focused-research-pilot/

Phase 2:

The Arts and Humanities Research Council funded an additional phase to the project which further developed the partnerships and ideas from Phase 1 with Angolan Women's Voice and Windrush generations in Nottingham. Students from NTU, led by community members, developed an amazing website recognising community heritage and as an archive of the project.

Phase 2 Project Website

Oral histories and other recordings were made as well preserving the memories and experiences of community members. These are available on the Building on History Website here: Phase 2 Videos

Heritage Lincolnshire worked with Nottingham Trent University colleagues again to explore the heritage. The outcomes of the whole project were presented at the 2024 Heritage and Democracy conference in Birmingham and are published in the conference papers here: https://books.ub.uni-heidelberg.de//arthistoricum/catalog/book/1649

Laura Dunham, Alice Ullathorne, Ana Souto, Heritage and Identity: Co-production and Wellbeing in Heritage Projects

Abstract:

This paper reports on Building on History, a project developed through Historic England (HE) and Historic Environment Scotland (HES), the main public bodies looking after the historic environment of England and Scotland. The project formed part of the umbrella programme Outreach to Ownership Pilot, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research
Council (England and Scotland). Building on History (delivered in two phases during 2021–2023) was a partnership project that supported community-led research, aiming to explore the value of the arts and humanities for minoritised communities, and promoted more inclusive forms of engagement with culture and heritage. The main stakeholders were Heritage Lincolnshire (HL), who secured the funding, and managed and led the project; community leaders and their groups, with whom the format was co-designed and the content of the workshops co-created; and academics and students from Nottingham Trent University (NTU), who facilitated the co-design and delivery of community workshops and project outputs such as questionnaires and websites.

Through the delivery of funded projects, HL and NTU have honed more democratic approaches to community participation in heritage, encouraging the promotion of cultural pride and identity and resulting in better wellbeing outcomes. In this paper, members of HL and NTU share their approaches to co-production and engagement on the Building on History project, within the Outreach to Ownership Pilot Programme – ranging from the development of heritage engagement strategies (outreach) to the co-creation of accessible digital tools that enabled the recognition of diverse heritage(s) (ownership). These methodologies are adaptable, flexible, and inclusive and enable communities to shape their places and recognise, as they did during the workshops, what they value – in other words, their heritage.