Serving Up Culture: Heritage and its Discontents at an Industrial History Site

Abstract

Arguing that heritage sites offer a particularly porous boundary between anthropologists and the discursive and social worlds of their informants, this article suggests that a public interest approach to research at such sites has the potential to capitalise on that porosity in ways that may be able to address anthropology’s traditional concerns with social inequality. The article uses a case study of a folk‐life demonstration at a US industrial heritage site to show how anthropological analysis might move beyond simply documenting patterns of exclusion and exoticism. By participating more actively in forums already populated by heritage professionals, convening new and more inclusive meeting grounds for discussion of heritage issues, and producing broader ethnographic studies of heritage sites, anthropologists can extend their analyses into more public and activist arenas, ultimately reframing the contemporary anthropological encounter as it occurs within social spaces created by heritage discourse.

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