teaching heritage collaboratively at the university of minnesota
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Society for American Archaeology 2012 77th
Annual Meeting, Memphis, TN
Session: Lessons from the Trenches: The Pedagogy of Archaeology and Heritage
Teaching Heritage Collaboratively at the University of Minnesota
By: Kat Hayes, Phyllis Messenger, Greg Donofrio, Anduin Wilhide, and Patrick Nunnally (University of
Minnesota, Twin Cities)
Abstract: University of Minnesota scholars of heritage-related disciplines convened a sponsored
research collaborative for the current academic year to explore an interdisciplinary pedagogical
approach to training heritage resource professionals. This group included both University researchers
(engaged in archaeology, architectural history and preservation, public history, natural resources, and
museums) and non-academic professionals and community constituents. In this paper we present the
summary of our findings on teaching heritage concepts common to our varied disciplines, engaging
students in community-based experiential learning, and broader community-university partnerships in
heritage resource management. This interdisciplinary collaboration can provide unique educational
experiences to students, and serve community needs.
In the spring of 2011, the Institute for Advanced Study at the University of Minnesota awarded funding
support to an interdisciplinary collaborative of researchers to create a working group on how to create
curriculum around heritage studies that would not only draw upon the expertise of multiple disciplines,
but that would also demonstrate the advantages of an interdisciplinary approach to community-
engaged heritage research and management. As a group, we originally were introduced to one another
in the aptly named Locating Heritage Collaborative; the new group was thus named the Teaching
Heritage Collaborative. Our core group of conveners represents archaeology, historic preservation in
architecture, landscape architecture, and public history; though we also had the interest of faculty in
museum studies, forestry and wildlife, American studies, American Indian studies, African/African-
American studies, and numerous community organizations in the Twin Cities area.
We have sought to address the core question: How can we train heritage professionals who hold the
interdisciplinary concept of heritage as central to their approach? A second question we have come to
is: What does interdisciplinarity truly mean in our practice, in terms of our core concepts of heritage
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study and management? Heritage is a term that has come to encompass the objects/subjects of study,
protection, preservation, and education across a wide range of disciplines. Until relatively recently,
topics as diverse as landscapes, histories, folk art, archaeological remains, archives, architecture and the
built environment, natural environment, languages, and traditional cultural practices were studied and
protected by specialized practitioners and communities. Scholars in those fields now recognize the
significant elision of concepts previously approached as distinct realms, like culture and nature, social
memory and history, past and present. As our fields are increasingly subsumed under the broader
concept of heritage, diverse practitioners recognize many commonalities of concern across their
disciplines. For example, all heritage professionals must deal with the question of how to protect,
preserve, and represent the value of these resources (recognizing that even the concept of resources is
problematic) to stakeholders and to wider publics, especially in light of contested/conflicting values.
Moreover, interdisciplinary conversations have opened new avenues to addressing those concerns.
The University of Minnesota, a public land-grant institution chartered in 1851, is a place with exciting
potential to bring together these perspectives in heritage studies teaching. As a Tier I research university
with five campuses, the University of Minnesota is home to some 65,000 students and more than 4,100
faculty. The flagship Twin Cities campus is located in a culture-rich urban area with a population of some
2.85 million people. The state has 20 Fortune 500 companies and 600 museums and historical societies
(twice the national average per capita). Minnesota (population 4.92 million) is home to seven
Anishinaabe reservations and four Dakato communities, as well as significant immigrant communities,
including northern and eastern Europeans who arrived in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,
and Hmong, Mexican, and Somali (among others) in recent years. As a state, we like to claim to be the
premiere arts center between the east and west coasts; we also are within easy driving distance of two
national forests, over 75 state parks, some 20 national wildlife refuges and management districts, and of
course, Lake Wobegon and classic rural America.
From this vantage point, the Teaching Heritage Collaborative began to take stock of where we are with
regard to teaching heritage studies at the University of Minnesota. We have multiple existing programs
with common goals, such as an M.S. degree program in architecture with a concentration in heritage
conservation and preservation; an M.A. in cultural heritage management (anthropology) with a focus on
archaeology; a museum studies graduate minor; and the educational programming of the River Life
program, in the Institute on the Environment, as well as the Tourism Center with its related class on
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heritage tourism and visitor behavior analysis. Although there is currently no program structure in place
for public history, there is significant effort to create at least a more targeted curriculum.
Students from a multitude of disciplines have demonstrated their desire, not only to learn about
heritage issues and their importance to communities, but also to find career opportunities in thesefields. As such, in each of our disciplines, we find we have been engaging in a more or less ad hoc
assembly of student internships and learning opportunities, by reaching out to the network of Twin
Cities agencies, organizations, and community groups working with heritage issues. These include the
Minnesota Historical Society (MHS), the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO), the Office of the State
Archaeologist (OSA), Minneapolis and St. Paul city planning offices, local non-profit preservation groups,
and the many fine museums both inside and outside of the University. These experiences are invaluable
to our students, yet we each have approached them from our own disciplinary perspectives. We feel
this has placed unnecessary restrictions on the opportunities students may find, and may not best
prepare students for the cross-disciplinary realities of professional practice. This indexes not only a lack
of shared concepts and goals to teach to our students, but often a disconnect from what community
heritage organizations wish for in the students that we send to them. Thus, while the University and the
Twin Cities are ideal grounds for teaching and training future heritage professionals, we needed a
concerted effort, such as our Teaching Heritage Collaborative, to envision how a coherent curricular
structure might look, and to assess the benefits such a curriculum would provide by coordinating its
content with community partners.
Who Are We? A Robust Overview of the Perspectives Being Brought Together
As a group we naturally share an interest in heritage in communities. We have found, however, that our
specific approaches converge and diverge in ways that are rather important to understand. Our
individual perspectives and goals in the group are described below.
Archaeology
Archaeology is represented at the University by a small number of faculty and researchers in
anthropology; a graduate program of both Ph.D. and M.A. students in that department; and an
enthusiastic group of undergraduates, mainly majoring in anthropology, classics and Near Eastern
studies, art history, history and geography, who take our courses. All of these departments are within
the College of Liberal Arts (CLA) at the University of Minnesota. All of these groups are important to the
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way in which we engage with heritage studies, but it is the M.A. students (Cultural Heritage
Management program) who have served as a focus for our curricular structures. We admit these
students on the basis of their desire to pursue a career in cultural resources management (CRM)
archaeology, but with the understanding that they may work in a private CRM firm, a state or federal
agency managing archaeological resources (among other properties), or a museum. Many
archaeologists who are engaged in what we refer to as the cultural heritage sector see their work as
connected to development, management, interpretation, and preservation issues related to the worlds
archaeological and historical sites. This field of practice requires archaeologists to become applied
anthropologists (Pyburn and Wilk 1995, Shackel and Chambers 2004), working closely with developers
and tourism offices; with nongovernmental agencies; and with historians, sociologists, interpreters,
preservation and planning professionals, museum staff, art historians and writers (Carman 2000, du Cros
and Lee 2007). This is an approach we wish to take, by building more explicit ties to these otherdepartments in our curriculum.
In our approach to teaching archaeology, heritage has multiple meanings that have not quite been
resolved with one another: on the one hand, cultural heritage is generally considered to be the record
of a people, manifest in the tangible (cultural relics, handicrafts, monuments, historic towns and
villages) and intangible (literature, theatre, music, folk customs) heritage of their culture (du Cros and
Lee 2007: 148). This places emphasis on those remains. On the other hand, Logan and Smith (2010: xi)
describe heritage as a social and political construct encompassing all those places, artefacts and
cultural expressions inherited from the past which, because they are seen to reflect and validate our
identity as nations, communities, families and even individuals, are worthy of some form of respect and
protection. They argue that it is critical to understand, respect, and incorporate the values and
practices of both the communities that feel a sense of ownership of their heritage and the scholars
and practitioners who study and manage heritage resources, including archaeological sites. Here
emphasis is given to present stakeholders. These two perspectives may be brought together in a social
science of the past, as understood both as tangible and intangible remains of the past, and their
relevance to contemporary communities (Chilton and Mason 2010). This latter aspect is emphasized in
the classroom when we discuss ethics, descendant communities, stakeholders, and publicly engaged
research. However, it does seem that the weight of classroom learning and practical work falls into the
realm of identifying, documenting, and managing the tangible remains, while the aspect of relevance is
to be gained through experience outside the classroom. Interpretation, education, and engagement
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cannot be modeled adequately in the classroom, so our M.A. students are strongly encouraged to
complete internships with agencies or organizations where they will take on these roles in practice.
These skills may be best learned, moreover, in the kinds of organizations that are oriented to public
engagement, rather than in CRM firms where such roles are not, strictly speaking, required. We have
made use, however, of the several initiatives focusing on undergraduate and graduate education that
have come out of archaeology-specific efforts to address this issue, and continue to develop today (see
Bender and Smith 2000; MATRIX 2003).
At the same time, there has been a growing recognition among many professionals in the field, and
reinforced through legislation, especially the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act
(NAGPRA) (see Soderland 2006; Messenger and Smith 2010; Jameson, Jr. 2008), that archaeologists are
but one group of specialists who have an interest in the study, interpretation, and disposition of the
past. There is a growing awareness that professionals working in this arena increasingly need a broader
set of skills and a greater understanding of such issues as globalization, economics, politics, and tourism.
In addition, postcolonialism, multivocality, and even radical religious and political movements have
changed the nature of work throughout the world (see du Cros and Lee 2007, Fairclough et al. 2008).
Archaeologists and heritage managers recognize the need to consult and collaborate with, not only
descendant communities, but also collectors, museum curators, developers, tourism professionals, and
politicians, as part of a larger and more complex cultural heritage sector.
Our approach to educating in this program walks a fine line. While we do wish for our students to be
successful in their job search on completing the degree, we do not want their program to be entirely
instrumentalist (Hamilakis 2004), not least by reproducing divisions between CRM or agency
archaeologists and academics, instilling a narrow focus on archaeological practice, or by thinking solely
in terms of the marketability of students as employees. We would like our students to recognize and
learn from the multiple concerned communities who value heritage in particular ways. We want our
students to be equally inspired by advanced graduate students in archaeology who are undertaking
extensive problem-oriented research often with high-tech methods, and by faculty and students in other
disciplines who take different perspectives on heritage (for instance, a focus on built environments,
cultural landscapes, and public history) and to consider them as their cohort. Conversely, we would like
our own Ph.D. students to think more expansively about the goals of academic archaeology, particularly
in relation to contemporary communities, and our undergraduates to have examples of the diversity of
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heritage studies outside of archaeologys grand narratives. Thus, our desire to engage in an
interdisciplinary heritage curriculum is a means of expanding the possibilities of the ways that our
students can think about their roles vis--vis heritage, as well as our own.
Historic Preservation
Since 2008, an M.S. with a concentration in Heritage Conservation and Preservation has been offered by
the School of Architecture, situated within the College of Design; its faculty consists of roughly a half
dozen adjunct and tenured or tenure-track professors who teach classes that are the requirements or
core of the curriculum, such as an introduction to historic preservation, architectural history,
documentation of historic buildings and landscapes, historic building conservation, world heritage, and
preservation economics. While these classes draw both upper-level undergraduates and graduate
students from a broad range of majors across the University, the pedagogical objectives of the program
are primarily oriented toward students enrolled in the Heritage Conservation and Preservation degree
program. These students tend to have two distinct backgrounds. Roughly half are studying for a Masters
of Architecture and seek a concurrent degree in heritage as a specialized addendum to their training in
architectural design. The other half come to the program having completed undergraduate degrees in
subjects other than architecture; most have liberal arts backgrounds in anthropology, history, and art
history. We admit students based on their interests in preservation, which we prefer to see expressed or
demonstrated through prior engagement in heritage-related coursework, volunteerism, internships, or
work experience. Because the program is still relatively new, it is too early to tell if the two distinct
backgrounds of our students lead to different career trajectories within or beyond heritage
management.
Professional, university-based historic preservation education is a relatively recent development in the
United States; courses in historic preservation became available at a few schools in the late 1950s, but it
was not until 1968 that James Marston Fitch established the first masters-level degree programs at
Columbia University. Several other programs were established elsewhere in rapid succession in the
decade that followed, most of them housed within older departments of architecture, landscape
architecture, planning, and especially architectural history (Tomlan 1994). Regardless of departmental
affiliation, preservation education has always been construed as broadly interdisciplinary professional
training combining coursework in the history, analysis, and documentation of architecture, and to a
lesser extent landscape, as well as policy, law, and economics. It has also largely focused somewhat
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narrowly on preserving the physical reality of buildings, structures, objects, and places, the artifactual
context of our environment (Stipe 2003:452).
The School of Architectures approach to heritage conservation and preservation is, on the one hand,
firmly rooted in the traditional artifact-centered approach; the object of preservation is assumed to bebuildings, landscapes, structures, and historic districts. On the other hand, we are enthusiastic about
emerging interests in and ideas about so-called intangible culture and community engagement. Our
adherence to an admittedly traditional curricular focus is likely driven by two influences: one, national
preservation education standards; and two, our perception of job opportunities. While the National
Council for Preservation (NCPE) Education Standards for Historic Preservation Degree Granting Graduate
and Undergraduate Programs rhetorically emphasize program diversity, and the plurality of disciplines
and skills demanded in the field, the only courses deemed fundamentalare those addressing the
history and documentation of the built environment (NCPE 2012). The NCPE Education Standards were
first developed in 1981 (Tomlan 1994) and do not yet encourage the adoption of new subjects to the
core. We may also be reticent to change the core of preservation education because the skills and
knowledge it prioritizes seem to correspond to our perceptions of job opportunities currently available
to our graduates. These include government positions administering federal, state, and local
preservation laws, jobs in the non-profit and education sectors, and private work in architectural design
and the conservation of architectural materials (Visser 2009).
Several more recent heritage concepts or approaches rooted in public history and anthropology suggest
a need for preservationists to reconsider the meanings and uses of historic places for communities in
the present. Cultural resource specialists are, in general, increasingly encouraged to go beyond merely
consulting the public about matters of historical significance and potential impacts to historic resources;
greater attention to community engagement will be necessary to identify, understand, document and,
indeed, protect a fuller range of sites and practices that have cultural values associated with nature,
religion, and subsistence, to name only a few (King 1998, Morgan et al. 2006). In a similar vein, some
suggest that public history will enable us to move beyond preservation so that historic sites become
relevant and stabilizing forces for communities (Hurley 2010). Assessing a broader range of heritage
values deemed important by diverse constituencies will require methodologies that preservationists are
not now generally being taught, including ethnographic and community planning approaches to
observation, interviews, and mapping (Mason 2002). Before it can effectively engage the public, the
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preservation community may also have to fundamentally change its theoretical orientation to the past.
Mason (2004) argues that in the standard preservation paradigm, places are deemed historic by virtue
of association with significant people, events, and design attributes, the meanings of which are
considered essentially stable and unchanging. A contrasting view maintains that because heritage is
experienced in the present, its uses and meanings are being constantly assessed and renegotiated by
the public (Smith 2006). The degree to which this academic writing and discourse is changing
professional preservation practice is unknown. However, the influence of our pedagogical design on the
education of future generations of preservation professionals is particularly meaningful in light of these
current debates. If we remain unresolved about who should address these issues or where they should
be placed in our curriculum, it may be because we are sensitive to the fact that a master s education is
relatively brief, and that the addition of new subject material may mean that other traditional topics of
study receive less attention.
Landscapes
Although there is a graduate degree program in Landscape Architecture, it does not explicitly focus on
heritage issues. Educational experiences in cultural or heritage landscapes are modeled in the unique
River Life program, run by one of our conveners who also teaches in the landscape architecture
department. Focusing on the Mississippi River National Parks corridor which runs through the
Minneapolis campus, this program facilitates student-community partnerships focusing on the many
aspects which make the river significant to contemporary communities. Of note, the River Life program
brings attention to the contested nature of the rivers heritage, for example with regard to the sacred
landscapes of the Dakota people now layered with the history of the development of the Twin Cities.
With regard to the preservation of cultural landscapes, the practice itself is so new that a li terature of
pedagogy has yet to emerge fully. The National Park Service only brought the preservation of landscapes
fully into the National Register-based historic preservation program in the early 1990s. Since then, while
the number of Historic Landscape reports has proliferated, the scholarly exploration of theoretical,
methodological, and ethical issues to arise from the practice has lagged. The pedagogical discussion has
lagged farther still, although a few titles have begun to emerge.
The project has brought exposure and greater familiarity with heritage-based disciplines other than
those concentrating on material culture of built form (e.g., architecture). It has been particularly
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instructive to understand the broader dynamic of the "heritage concept" as disciplines such as
archaeology, public history, and some of the newer scholarship in architectural history and preservation
has developed. "Heritage" as cultural dynamic offers important avenues for unpacking the very complex
set of imperatives that have created the cultural landscape, and that will in the best instances guide its
preservation. That dynamic will continue to inform the teaching of heritage landscape preservation in
important ways that have yet to unfold.
Public History
Public history is a challenging term to define. It can encompass a wide array of people, productions,
and activities that involve doing history in the public realm with multiple audiences. Public history
takes place in historical societies, in academia, in museums, in documentaries, in living history sites, and
in how people experience the landscapes of places. It includes two key components: creating more
inclusive historical narratives that represent a wide array of experiences and engaging publics in shaping
historical consciousness (see Porter et al. 1986, Horton and Horton 2006, Elliot 2007, Stanton 2006,
Walkowitz and Knauer 2009). The academic field of public history in the United States emerged in the
1970s and 1980s from the New Social History movement (Tyrell 2005).
Public history at the University of Minnesota is sustained by a small group of dedicated faculty, staff, and
students who seek to engage individuals and communities in the varied processes of history-making and
making history matter. We take to heart the goal of sharing authority in historical research,
documentation, and storytelling, based on ideas first set forth by Michael Frisch (1990). Public history
advocates at the University encourage collaborative initiatives between academics and community
partners to conduct historical research, to get involved in history education and curriculum
development, to create community-based archives, and to construct historical narratives through
various media (print, video, digital). While there is not a formalized Public History program, there are
many opportunities for undergraduate and graduate students to get involved with community partners
in various avenues of doing history. These opportunities include courses, research projects, and
internships, as well as self-directed public history projects. For example, the Minnesota History Day
Program (part of National History Day) provides a mentorship program for undergraduate students to
get involved in history education in local public high schools. Graduate students coordinate this program
by connecting students with schools and host a library tour program that brings thousands of high
school students onto campus to conduct research at University libraries. Students in interdisciplinary
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undergraduate and graduate courses on public history discuss issues in the field and then focus on
neighborhoods in the Twin Cities and coordinate public history projects with community partners.
The world of digital media has opened up a number of possibilities for creating community-based digital
archives, as well as finding new avenues for digital storytelling and digital history. The UniversitysImmigration History Research Center (IHRC) provides public history opportunities on campus, including
encouraging recent immigrant and refugee students to work with graduate students and faculty on
creating digital archives, for example the Minnesota 2.0 Digital Facebook Archive (IHRC 2009) and the
Sheeko: Somali Youth Oral History project (IHRC 2011).
While there are exciting opportunities to get involved in public history activities, there is not yet a
cohesive or comprehensive undergraduate or graduate program at the University. In fact, there is only
one higher education institution in Minnesota that offers a graduate degree in Public History (St. Cloud
State University). For now, faculty and students at the University of Minnesota who are interested in
public history must create their own program. For faculty, this involves creating and sustaining public
history initiatives on top of already demanding schedules of teaching, research, and writing. Public
engagement is not considered in tenure decision-making and many of the faculty involved in public
history go above and beyond what the department recognizes as valuable.
For students, creating their own public history program involves participating in classes in other
departments where aspects of public history are addressed (geography, historic preservation, American
studies, cultural studies) and taking directed study courses with individual professors to address topics
related to their interests. With a cultural landscape where disciplines operate in a silo mentality, it can
be challenging for students to find interdisciplinary, supportive and sustainable networks with others
interested in public history. It can be difficult to find classes that provide the kinds of professional
training needed in public history such as oral history, museum exhibit design, or video and web
production. Moreover, public history initiatives are most successful when trusting relationships with
community partners can be developed through sustained effort.
Bringing the Stakeholders to the Table
In the fall of 2011, we began the process of assembling perspectives, desires, and issues by bringing
stakeholders to the table to discuss a curricular structure that might draw on faculty expertise and
interest, create opportunities for students, and coordinate with the needs of community partners. The
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Teaching Heritage Collaborative is advancing its objectives with three types of meetings: 1) monthly
meetings of the conveners and of the research team, which includes student assistants and their
supervisors; 2) periodic meetings with larger groups for information gathering and networking; and 3)
public lectures and consultations with visiting scholars.
Small group meetings
Research conducted by undergraduates from the School of Architecture and the Department of History
has made a significant contribution to the Collaboratives work. Our undergraduate researchers began
by surveying the national scene of heritage-related pedagogy, with a particular eye to what
interdisciplinary programs existed and how they were structured. Anthropology, historic preservation,
public history, and archives graduate programs were surveyed via web presence, beginning with lists
from some key national organizations (Society for Historical Archaeology, National Council for
Preservation Education, National Council on Public History, and the American Historical Association).
These lists were supplemented by collaborative researchers own recommendations. Literature reviews
found relatively little scholarship about heritage educationits goals, methods, values, or
transdisciplinary potential. Accordingly, we asked students to compile a database of programs
recommended by collaborators from their respective disciplines (anthropology, archaeology, historic
preservation, public history), particularly schools and programs teaching across departmental and
disciplinary lines. The resulting data is now informing our program and curricular discussions, as well as
our scholarship. For example, our preliminary program research shows that there are few truly
interdisciplinary degree programs, but there are a number of singular programs associated with
interdisciplinary research centers.
Large Group Networking and Brainstorming
Meeting 1: New Ways of Teaching Heritage.For our first large group meeting, held in fall 2011, we
convened faculty from around the University who teach heritage-related subjects to discuss
collaborating on curriculum and program development. We had remarkably diverse and enthusiastic
attendance by colleagues from American studies, American Indian studies, anthropology, architecture,
landscape architecture, history, museum studies, and the IHRC; we also had adjunct-faculty
representatives from MHS, OSA, and for-profit preservation firms. Regular faculty, adjunct faculty, and
graduate students were represented.
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Disciplinary distinctions were acknowledged in the discussion, but there was also agreement that if we
could address the connections (and potential conflicts) among them, this would be a significant
achievement, perhaps even what sets the University of Minnesota apart from other institutions
pedagogical approaches to heritage/public history. Several participants were new to the broader
University discussions about heritage education; many were eager to continue the discussion.
The sentiment in this meeting was that our goal should be both to educate impassioned amateurs and
to train professionals. Faculty felt that these are not mutually exclusive threads, though they do require
a broader approach to capture both applied heritage management and critical intellectual practices.
Graduate students in the discussion noted also that simply having ones cohort include students across
these many fields would encourage more interdisciplinary conversations. Participants felt that the
enterprise has to have an intellectual project at its core; it is not enough just to fill a vocational need or
put bodies in the seats for the purposes of capturing tuition. In this respect, faculty were acutely aware
of the potential gap between the mission of our teaching and the fiscally driven constraints or wishes of
the University administration, especially at the college level. However, there is recognition that
engagement with community members is professionally important, and is now stated as a core value of
the University that acknowledges the understanding of shared authority. Moreover, it is both in
alignment with University directions and an ethical imperative (i.e. informing and being informed by
diverse communities, raising the issues both are interested in, addressing the issue of ontological
security).
Perhaps somewhat stickier was the issue of the common bases of our approach to heritage or public
history. Even the labeling of our field is at issue: not all participants were comfortable with the term
heritage, preferring instead the designations that emphasize the public, as in public history or public
archeology. These concerns touch upon potentially important differences in the conceptual vocabulary
of our various disciplines, specifically the question, To whom does heritage belong? However,
participants seemed resistant at this stage to discussing those conceptual bases, preferring instead to
celebrate the diversity and extent of our subject matter, including tangible and intangible heritage, and
the inquiries of public history. Despite the resistance, there was recognition that we must address
disciplinary distinctions and potential conflicts at some point before we can create a truly
interdisciplinary heritage curriculum.
Meeting 2: Partnering with Community Organizations and Public Agencies for Student Experience.
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The Teaching Heritage Collaborative tapped its virtual Rolodex to invite representatives of regional
organizations that already have, or might consider creating, internships for heritage-studies students.
Attendance at this late fall 2011 meeting was again remarkable in number, breadth, and level of
support. Representatives came from MHS, SHPO, St. Paul Heritage Preservation Commission, Science
Museum of Minnesota, National Park Service (three separate offices), Swedish-American Institute,
Historic St. Paul, Hennepin History Museum, and the Universitys Goldstein Museum of Design, as well
as from University programs with established internship programs such as the Center for Urban and
Regional Affairs (CURA) and the Community Service-Learning Center. The discussion focused on how
best to create internships that benefited both students and community partner organizations, without
an undue burden being placed on either.
Participants sought to clarify how internships can be thought of as either project-specific or standing
programs. Many of our contributing professionals felt that it was easier to have internships that were
project-specific. Establishing open communications between our programs and their institutions with
regard to those project needs would be a desirable approach to making internships more consistently
available. Partner institutions agreed that they could alert faculty to specific skills that they would like
students to have. In addition, suggestions were made for bringing professionals into the classroom;
course and internship pairings (e.g. 2-semester sequences) or course-based projects (e.g. the public
history course); laying groundwork with education directed at undergrad and K-12 students; and being
mindful of the variable learning curve for certain projects and preparing accordingly. Perhaps most
telling, our partner organizations taught us that they are less concerned with the disciplinary
background or purity of the student than the university structure is. They recognize that internships are
opportunities for intern networking outside of the university structure, and they desire competent and
creative thinkers, rather than historians or archaeologists.
We were also able to outline some of the most significant difficulties that plague student internship
opportunities. Timing and coordination of schedules is clearly an important issue. Some frustration was
expressed with the constraints of the academic calendar, but many of our contributors acknowledged
the need to accommodate to it. More careful coordination in planning for the internships would ease
this problem. Although these internships often require tremendous supervisory investment by the host
organization, the availability of supervision is variable in part dependent upon the size of the office or
agency (in the case of the SHPO, literally the physical size of the office). Often this investment is not
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justified by the benefit to either party. Likewise, evaluation of student learning objectives is
problematic, particularly if the internships are done for academic credit. What is the product expected
of the student? If it is not project-based work, these benchmarks may be difficult to define. These issues
need to be clarified before the internship. Finally, while not all internships can be paid, most institutions
agreed that when they are able they like to offer paid positions, in part because they foster greater
investment from the intern. Other possibilities to explore on that front, especially for undergrads, may
be UROP (Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program) or work-study positions.
Meeting 3: Public History and Heritage Studies Program Development.Teaching Heritage conveners
and collaborators from several departments met in December 2011 to discuss potential curriculum and
program development. There was interest in developing new content and synergies without duplicating,
or competing with, existing programs like the Museum Studies Graduate Minor. There was consensus
for working toward creation of both a graduate minor and a certificate in Heritage Studies and Public
History. This conclusion was based in part upon our desire to serve two constituencies: existing
graduate students and professionals seeking additional training. Additionally, unlike a stand-alone
degree program, these two new programs could be more easily implemented within the current
University structure. As a working structure, the participants agreed that the graduate minor, which
could be completed by students in any number of departments, would be a four-course (12 cr.)
sequence consisting of a core concepts and approaches course; two electives, one of which must be in a
discipline outside of the students major field; and a capstone course culminating in a community-
engaged project. At this time, we are soliciting wider interest among departments, particularly with
suggestions for elective courses. But, as might be expected, the discussion of what would be covered in
a core concepts seminar is slower to materialize. Faculty researchers seem to be more project-oriented
in their approach to curriculum, and less willing to engage in interdisciplinarity at a conceptual level.
These theoretical frameworks will undoubtedly be needed in order to argue for the establishment of a
new degree program; with the recent dissolution of a centralized graduate school, and a general
unwillingness on the part of the University to breach college boundaries (our collaborative draws from
several), a cohesive front will be required in order to transcend disciplinary borders.
Public Lectures and Consultations with Visiting Scholars
Finally, we have hosted three public lectures by nationally recognized scholars who direct
interdisciplinary heritage programs. Each guest participated in a small round-table discussion with the
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collaborative about heritage education, community engagement, and research. Colleagues from within
and beyond the University have attended these presentations. Our invited speakers (and their topics)
included Liz evenko (Director of the Guantnamo Public Memory Project at Columbia University: A
Guantnamo Site of Conscience? Remembering Gitmo long beforeand long after9-11), Elizabeth
Chilton (Director of the Center for Heritage and Society at the University of Massachusetts Amherst:
Why Does the Past Matter? Towards a Social Science of the Past), and Randall Mason (Chair, Program
in Historic Preservation, University of Pennsylvania: The Long-term Future of Heritage and its
Conservation: Will There be a Heritage Conservation Field in 50 Years?). Each of these scholars is
calling for an approach to the past that is less entrenched in the evidential or disciplinary specificities,
and more attentive to the role and impact of heritage to contemporary communities. While none would
advocate abandoning the foundational knowledge that comes from our home disciplines of history,
archaeology/anthropology, and architecture/urban planning, significantly each has pursued researchthrough institutions outside of universities, or that transcend university academic units. These projects
and discussions raised an additional consideration: Would our purposes be better served by creating an
interdisciplinary research center for community-engaged heritage projects, rather than a heritage-based
curriculum?
What Have We Learned
Where do we stand now with the effort to create an interdisciplinary structure for heritage studies? Our
survey of researchers, communities, programs and institutions has pointed to two sides of the heritage
curriculum coin: project-based approaches (bringing different disciplines together in the context of
specific cases), and interdisciplinary method and theory. Examples of the former are easily found, and
the most structurally expedient way to facilitate these project-based heritage studies in the university
setting is through research centers. This is an approach that we are now taking seriously. It is a more
immediate way to tap and channel the tremendous enthusiasm among researchers, students, and
communities for bringing together the diversity of heritage scholarship under one umbrella, facilitating
both access to funding sources and public awareness. The University of Minnesota recognizes that as a
public land-grant institution, it is entirely within its mission to support these community partnerships, as
well as foster students awareness of their stewardship roles. A research center is also better equipped
to foster longer-term community relationships than can be tended on a semester-by-semester basis.
One of the drawbacks to beginning with a research center, however, is that centers often do not
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command the necessary level of investment in the long term from either faculty scholars or the
university. Currently, the new University president has initiated a system-wide review of the efficacy of
all centers and institutions, with the aim of reducing their numbers.
But does having scholars from multiple disciplines, working under the aegis of a single center forheritage and community, constitute, in and of itself, an interdisciplinary approach? That is to say, does
the method and theory of heritage studies as its own discipline (not a combination of archaeology,
preservation, public history, and natural resources) follow automatically? Clearly not, as our ongoing
association as a collaborative continues to struggle with focusing on the common concepts and goals
among us. Perhaps in part this is because we tend to be project-oriented, or if you like, management-
oriented in our collaboration, needing specific context to explore in order to understand one another.
Also, while we readily agree on an inclusive epistemology which comes with the understanding that
heritage values are locally constructed we also understand that we need not share the same toolkit of
methods. This argues that we cannot leave behind our own home disciplines when it comes to teaching
that toolkit. But for defining common theoretical frameworks, it would be tremendously beneficial to
team-teach seminars across disciplines and colleges, which remains a significant challenge at this
University due to financial considerations related to tuition revenue sharing. We have noted in our
review of heritage studies graduate programs that very few have overcome this hurdle, and very often
the interdisciplinary program is dominated by one or two departments, and does not engage in team-
teaching.
The longer-term task, if we are to move towards a truly interdisciplinary collaboration and curriculum, is
to step back to the drawing-board of theory and method. Method, in this case, would not consist in
how to excavate a site or complete documentation of a structure or use archives. For us, method
should consist in how to both access and communicate the importance of the past to concerned
stakeholders; how to navigate between competing or conflicting claims; how to navigate among
multiple epistemologies; approaches to sustainability, conservation, preservation; and how to measure
the real effects of heritage preservation projects on communities (per Chilton and Mason 2010). We
need also to better formulate theoretical approaches: why do we remember, or forget, the past
(Connerton 1989, 2009; Harrison 2007)? What do we mean by public or global heritage? How does
knowledge of the past circulate? How is that knowledge made meaningful, or abused? What would a
decolonized heritage studies look like? Where are the multiple sites of these processes - archives, sites,
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neighborhoods, museums, but also websites and other digital media, classrooms, community or family
settings? All of these issues and approaches are ones which can, and should, begin outside of specific
disciplines, if we are to break the gravity of resource centered approaches. Before we can prepare
students for the rapidly shifting transdisciplinary field of heritage studies, we ourselves must come to
some shared understanding of what that is.
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