Dr Rachael Kiddey
Research Interests
Rachael’s research combines anthropological and archaeological approaches to the contemporary past, incorporating: 1) a focus on the development of participatory and collaborative methods for engaging diverse publics in cultural heritage work, and: 2) a keen interest in the ways in which cultural heritage approaches to contemporary social issues can enhance advocacy and improve policy.
Current Activities
Rachael Kiddey is a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship researcher based at the School of Archaeology. She has just started a project called ‘Migrant Materialities’, which focuses on the role that material culture – objects and visual culture – plays in experiences of forced displacement in Europe. Before this, Rachael was postdoctoral researcher on a joint AHRC/ESRC funded project, with the Refugee Studies Centre at the Oxford Department of International Development, called ‘Architectures of Displacement: The Experiences and Consequences of Emergency Shelter’. Rachael was previously a postgraduate student at the Department of Archaeology at the University of York, where she completed her doctoral study in 2014. Rachael is a member of the Chartered Institute for Archaeologists (CIfA) and of the Society for Historical Archaeology (SHA). Prior to returning to academia, aged 32, Rachael worked as a documentary radio producer for BBC Radio 3 and Radio 4.
Rachael’s doctoral research involved developing methodologies for working archaeologically with homeless people; documenting how heritage can function in socially useful and transformative ways. This research was shortlisted for the Times Higher Education Award for Widening Participation Initiative of the Year 2012 and was shortlisted for the Society for Historical Archaeology’s Mark E. Mack Community Engagement Award 2016. Rachael has published in a range of peer-reviewed journals, including the International Journal of Heritage Studies, Public Archaeology, the Journal of Contemporary Archaeology and Post-medieval Archaeology. She has also published in popular magazines, including British Archaeology and The Big Issue. Rachael has written book chapters for key edited volumes including The Oxford Handbook of Public Archaeology and The Routledge Guide to Contemporary Anthropology. Rachael’s monograph ‘Homeless Heritage’was published in 2017 Oxford University Press and is the 2019 winner of the Society for Historical Archaeology’s James Deetz Book Award. Rachael has also appeared on a range of broadcast media including BBC Inside Out West (TV) and BBC Radio 4’s ‘Thinking Allowed’. She blogs about archaeology at https://rachaelkiddey.blog
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Reluctant Refuge: An Activist Archaeological Approach to Alternative Refugee Shelter in Athens (Greece)
Kiddey, RJanuary 2019|Journal article|Journal of Refugee Studies -
From the ground up: cultural heritage practices as tools for empowerment in the Homeless Heritage project
Kiddey, RAugust 2018|Journal article|International Journal of Heritage Studies -
Homeless Heritage Collaborative Social Archaeology As Therapeutic Practice
Kiddey, ROctober 2017|BookDrawing on fieldwork undertaken in Bristol and York, the book first describes the way in which archaeological methods and theory have come to be usefully applied to the contemporary world, before exploring the historical development of the ...Literary Collections -
Hand in Hand: homelessness, heritage and collaborative approaches to the material past
KIDDEY, REdited by:Coleman, S, Hyatt, S, Kingsolver, AJanuary 2016|Chapter|The Routledge Companion to Contemporary Anthropology