40 C O N T E X T 9 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 0 6 Notes from the chair Chauvinistic myths in an eclectic world Joined-up conservation. Now there’s a phrase we’ll be hearing more of in the next year. So let’s explore it, unpack it even, as we continue the long wait for the white paper. Actually, we’re waiting for two white papers (heritage and local government), as well as for the government’s response to the Culture Media and Sport Select Committee drubbing on resources. But don’t hold your breath. In this issue of Context there’s plenty of ‘joining up’ on the largest possible scale: international activity. Let’s admit that most of us have only the haziest and patchiest idea of how the historic environment is valued and conserved in other countries and other cultures. For those of us at the sharp end of conservation the demands of detail, quality and time are such that the big international picture seldom comes into focus. In my own experience, and I work with a broader brush on a bigger canvas than many, I usually see all too little of conservation beyond our shores. I meet other conservation practitioners in the public and private sectors who have even tighter horizons, with very little professional awareness outside their own locality or region. What an irony! After all, the actual raw material on which we work, the historic environment of a small clutch of offshore European countries, is part of an utterly joined-up European culture. There’s hardly a structure, hardly a landscape, hardly an old place that doesn’t bear the imprint of another country, and many carry the messages of other cultures too. The joined-up historic environment is all around us. Even the most vernacular of buildings will show something from beyond our shores. The wonderful accretive place in which we live is no respecter of the present arrangement of nation states. Perhaps the current political emphasis on ‘identity’ should take more account of this eclectic world we live in.While the individual will identify with his or her cherished local scene, the idea that whole sections of society can identify with a particular kind of historic place over a longer period is a dangerous and chauvinistic myth. That’s the problem with the H word, ‘heritage’: all too easily the subtext that ‘this is mine’ can continue to the corollary ‘and it’s not yours’. But now back to joining up, and not in a conscriptive sense. Professional associations such as ours can, should and do widen the horizons of their members. That is part of their principal function as upholders of standards. So the more links we can make with comparable organisations and activities elsewhere in the world the better. We have a particular opportunity right now to make closer links with countries in central and eastern Europe. They share our history, but a hard 20th century means that there is plenty of sharing of ideas and experience to catch up on. Our Romanian links are a beginning, and let’s take every opportunity to make more such contacts. We can help each other with lost skills and lost values. Perhaps we can help some of them avoid the worst pitfalls of instant development, while some of them can show us the green benefits of lower and more local technology. Meanwhile, back at the virtual IHBC office, there’s more joining up in the air, or not. Since Power of Place we have seen historic places as a seamless whole, and it looks likely that the legislation will eventually (c2010) catch up with that revelation. It also looks likely that local governance will follow the legislation, and that the conservation professions in the public sector will inevitably work more closely together than at present. That means conservation staff and archaeologists in particular. We can already see this happening in the private sector, where multidisciplinary consultancies are clearly on the rise. So it’s no surprise or secret that the All Party Parliamentary Archaeology Group has persuaded English Heritage to fund a study by the Professional Associations Research Network (PARN) into the potential and options for closer links between the IHBC and the Institute of Field Archaeologists (IFA). The PARN report has now arrived, and will be discussed in our council before wider consultation. It explores a number of options, ranging from ‘no change’ through ways of cooperative working to a full merger. How far will we want to take joining up? And how fast? Watch this space. JohnYates, [email protected]
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