The Victoria County History and participatory historical geography

Abstract

Abstract This article critically reflects on the Victoria County History's (VCH) relationship with participatory historical geography approaches. Telling a story of change, it argues that it is not only possible, but also extremely productive for long‐standing, well‐established academic research projects to embrace participatory approaches and engage in transformative research. The VCH is a national project to write the history of every parish‐sized area in England. Begun in 1899, the VCH's contemporary network of place‐based historians still actively pursues this goal. Overseen by a central editorial team, most of the network's activities are conceived, run and funded by independent county trusts. These trusts research and write the VCH's well‐known ‘Big Red Books’ and a range of shorter publications, but have also begun to cultivate participatory projects that embed local communities in the development of local histories and allow these communities to reflect on how their histories have shaped their collective identities. Focusing on the project's engagement with local knowledge and communities, this article traces the VCH's use of collaborative and participatory methodologies. Acknowledging the VCH's routes in Victorian encyclopaedic endeavours, it critically reflects on how it collaborated with local people during the early twentieth century. Shifting its attention to the early twenty‐first century, it then considers how the VCH has begun to develop frameworks for engaging in individually, socially and academically transformative research. While recognising the limitations of these approaches, it highlights the latent potential within the VCH's emerging engagement with participatory historical geography approaches and, emphasising how the project's future depends on continual integration of participatory methods within its activities and outputs, identifies several ways in which the VCH could continue to develop its participatory methods.

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