Asset, burden, Cultybraggan. Community site ownership in a Scottish village

Thomas, S. and Banks, I. (2019) Asset, burden, Cultybraggan. Community site ownership in a Scottish village. Journal of Community Archaeology and Heritage, 6(1), pp. 51-68. (doi: 10.1080/20518196.2018.1548223)

Abstract

In 2007, the residents of the village of Comrie, Scotland, collectively bought the site of Cultybraggan Camp and nearby hillside land through a ‘community buy-out’ scheme under the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003. A Development Trust, made up primarily of voluntary trustees from the village, manages the site. It has goals of promoting environmental awareness as well as the site’s unique cultural heritage. Cultybraggan’s history as a prisoner of war camp during the Second World War intended to hold ‘hardcore’ Nazi prisoners, and then as a Ministry of Defense training camp engenders mixed feelings from residents and visitors alike. In this article, we reflect on our findings from ethnographic and public archaeology fieldwork in summer 2017. We use the case study of Cultybraggan to problematize the concept of community ownership of cultural heritage sites, especially those perceived as having a difficult or controversial history.

• Item Type: Articles
• Additional Information: The excavation at Cultybraggan was funded by Historic Environment Scotland’s Culture and Heritage Infrastructure Scheme 2014–2020 SA.41194 as project 99653, with support from the University of Glasgow’s School of Humanities. Thomas' fieldwork was funded by the Royal Society of Edinburgh/Caledonian Research Fund European Visiting Research Grant. Thomas' research is also part of the project ‘Lapland’s Dark Heritage: Understanding the Cultural Legacy of Northern Finland’s WWII German Materialities within Interdisciplinary Perspective’ (Academy of Finland, decision no. 275497).
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Banks, Dr Iain
• Authors: Thomas, S., and Banks, I.
• College/School: College of Arts & Humanities > School of Humanities > History
• Journal Name: Journal of Community Archaeology and Heritage
• Publisher: Taylor and Francis
• ISSN: 2051-8196
• ISSN (Online): 2051-820X
• Published Online: 22 November 2018
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2018 The Authors
• First Published: First published in Journal of Community Archaeology and Heritage 6(1): 51-68
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced under a Creative Commons License