Common Stories: Researching the History of your local Common
The ‘Building Commons Knowledge’ research project is a new 1-year project exploring the history, culture and contemporary sustainability of common land in England and Wales. The project is a partnership between the Universities of Newcastle and Lancaster, The Foundation for Common Land and The National Trust.
As part of this project, historians Professor Angus Winchester and Dr Eleanor Straughton will be providing an online ‘Commons History Toolkit’, and will be holding a small number of free research workshops in autumn 2012 in Cumbria, Yorkshire, the South West, and Wales.
The aim is to recapture something of the unwritten history of common land in England and Wales in the 20th century, to chronicle how commons were used and managed, to chart the changes which have taken place in living memory, and to record cultural events (sports, fairs etc) linked to common land. Commoners and local historians are invited to work together to record oral testimonies and explore the documentary and landscape history of their commons. Findings submitted to the project will be posted online in a ‘Resource Bank’ accessible to all.
If you would like to be kept informed of the date/venue of workshops or would like to know more about the historical aspect of the project, please contact Eleanor Straughton at e.straughton@lancaster.ac.uk or visit our website http://commons.ncl.ac.uk for more details.
