CHPC Research focuses on the notion of critical heritage, which considers places, pasts and traditions in contemporary life alongside heritage’s traditional concerns with conservation and restoration. Critical heritage, as a discipline, reconceptualises heritage by paying attention to themes such as power, identity, economic development and conflict, and by engaging with other areas of critical enquiry such as memory studies, creative tourism, feminist theory, material culture studies, and cultural geography.
In particular, research focuses on design practices within the context of heritage, and aims to foster collaborative projects and discussions on the interaction between tradition and contemporary society, and how this is visually expressed. This includes investigating new emerging patterns of space/place, exhibition design, and place consumption (amongst others).
The cross-disciplinary nature of the research means that its members come from different research areas and backgrounds. Our current members include:
This research has a dual focus: it examines broad theories and conceptions of creativity, including personal-centred approaches of neuroscience and psychology, relationships-centred approaches of sociology and anthropology, and wider context-centred approaches of economics, urban studies and web studies.
The second is concerned with broad social and cultural analyses of the creative and cultural industries, how various creative ecologies emerge, how informal creative hubs and networks operate, and how cultural policy might best approach and work with these more informal creative spaces.
Seminar series 2020-21. Dr. Ben Anderson, Keele University, 'Decommissioning the Twentieth Century? Public Engagement Research in a Pandemic'.