Heritage Making, Transnational Subjectivity, and Deheritagization at an Archaeological Site in Turkey (20 min)

Presenters

Sevil Tırpan, Istanbul Technical University

Abstract

Archaeologists often assume that archaeological material should be automatically accepted as valuable heritage by the local communities. The ultimate goal is the conservation, protection, and preservation of archaeological heritage. Therefore, many projects try to produce sustainable heritage management plans. Public archaeology methods are promoted to inform various publics about archaeological heritage and to encourage them to participate in the protection and preservation processes. However, archaeologists’ heritage-making and protection practices may not be received without challenges by local communities. At every site where I worked as an archaeologist, especially in Turkey, I was struck by the wide gap between the archaeologists and people living nearby in understanding the purpose of excavation and the site’s meaning and history. This paper investigates archaeology’s relationship with local communities, and explores how experts produce and preserve “heritage.” Also discussed are the profound ways in which such heritagization affects people’s everyday lives in places that are transformed by archaeological practice. I present the results of a longitudinal archaeological ethnography I conducted in Şahmuratlı near the well-known Iron-Age site of Kerkenes (central Turkey). Local communities living near the Kerkenes site share a different perception and approach about the site, archaeology, and heritage than the archaeologists who run the research project at the site.  Their unique subjectivities as migrant-workers in Europe, nationalist political views, and sensory relationships with the site shape these differences. I argue that academics and heritage professionals should develop an awareness of local histories, subjectivities, and embodied relationships with archaeological places before initiating the practices of heritage-making and public archaeology.