Abstract:

What happens when learning in a strict sense becomes more than learning, and what goes on when the archaeology of a public participation archaeology project ends up as more than archaeology? Building on first-hand teaching experiences, as well as collected survey data from pupils and teachers attending an archaeological public participation project as part of Hestvikholmane 2012, a NTNU University Museum archaeological excavation project in the municipality of Averøya, northwest Norway, this article will provide a case in point as well as some considerations of a theoretical framework capable of analyzing such instances.

In 2012, Hestvika, a small rural valley down to the fjord, with pastoral fields and an abandoned 19th century farmstead surrounded by a coastal landscape of cliffs and pine trees, was to give room for a large industrial terminal area. Exceptionally rich in thick layers of Stone Age settlement remains beneath the pastoral soil between the sheltered nooks and crannies of the cliffs, six locations were selected for archaeological excavations before the entire landscape was stripped to bedrock and demolished to a flat industrial surface 4-5 meters above sea level.

In Norway, a public participation effort is often a requirement for large-scale excavation projects. At Hestvikholmane 2012, this included all (1st – 10th grade) schools in the municipality of Averøya, where an archaeologist would visit every school for a session of classroom archaeology before a field day of walking around and exploring the landscape, the ongoing excavation sites, and some of the 8 - 10 000 years old remains of human dwelling in Hestvika.

Not according to plan, the industrial demolition of the landscape had already started, in parallel with the archaeological excavation. As a didactic compromise, the nearby industrial sights, sounds, and smells were deliberately put in context with the uncovered archaeological traces of prehistoric human activities, connecting the archaeological narrative of the valley to the present and accentuating the depth of time and the lifespan of the cultural landscape.

Then something happened: at the end of our walk, from a point providing an extensive final view of the valley, all of the recently uncovered Stone Age dwellings, as well as the industrial demolition of the landscape close behind, groups of visiting pupils did not leave, but remained watching motionless, close together and very quiet for several minutes. At that moment, the participation project had become something else. For many of the pupils, this was their local recreational area from early childhood. Just now, they had become aware of thousands of years of human past to this landscape, as well as its immediate destruction.

This article retraces Hestvikholmane 2012 as a context for affective existential learning. As such, what is a sufficient framework for analyzing instances of public participation in terms of learning, and to what extent can archaeological notions of rhizomatic learning, assemblage theory, and archaeotherapy be useful for understanding what happens when learning and archaeology become more groundbreaking, personal, and non-verbal?

Keywords:

Experiential learning, Public participation archaeology, Affective learning, Place-based education, Cultural landscape learning.