Co-Creation as a Twenty-First Century Archaeology Museum Practice
Open accessAbstract
This paper evaluates attempts over the past seven years to address two archaeological challenges at the C.H. Nash Museum at Chucalissa. The first challenge was the proper curation of 50 years of accumulated collections from a wide array of sources by a staff one-third the size of when the collections were acquired. Second, the Museum faced the challenge of becoming a viable and socially relevant public institution in the twenty-first century. Ultimately, the C.H. Nash Museum embraced a co-creative approach to face the challenges. Co-creative processes resulted in a renewed and expanded base for public engagement, allowing the Museum to maximize the potential for preservation, research accessibility, and the exhibition of cultural materials curated at the institution.
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In an application where users create content about heritage elements, users created much more content than expected, driven by motivation and interest.
“An example of this concept's application is described in [20], where users create diverse types of content about heritage elements.As a result, it has been observed that they have created much more content than expected, driven by their motivation and interest in doing their best.”
From Motiv-ARCHE: co-creation of augmented reality educational content to motivate cultural and natural heritage learning (2025) · cites this paper as [20]
The discussion of the CHNM projects describes community members and students creating exhibits, oral histories, and other heritage-related materials in response to their interests. It does not report that they created much more content than expected or attribute an unexpectedly high output to their motivation to do their best. (LLM, conf=0.84)
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Research works printed but not linked: 11
- Chambers, Erve 2004 Epilogue. In Places in Mind: Public Archaeology as Applied Anthropology, edited by Paul A. Shackel and Erve J. Chambers, pp. 193-208. Routledge, New York.
- Connolly, Robert P. 2011 From Actors to Directors: Evolving Voices of American Indians in Museum Presentations. Practicing Anthropology 33(2):35-39. 2015 Archaeology, Museums and Outreach. Electronic document, http://www.rcnnolly.wordpress.com, accessed April 27, 2015.
- Connolly, Robert P., Rebecca E. Bria, and Elizabeth Cruzado Carranza 2015 Co-creating with Indigenous Communities in Huaylas, Peru. In Engagement and Access: Innovative Approaches for Museums, edited by Juilee Decker, pp. 71-78. AltaMira Press, New York.
- Connolly Robert P., Samantha E. Gibbs, and Mallory L. Bader 2012 Transforming a Museum into a Community Stakeholder and Asset. Museums and Social Issues 7(2):227-244.
- Connolly Robert P., and Natalye B. Tate 2011 Volunteers as Mission. Collections 7(3):325-346. Cultural Heritage in Southwest Memphis 2015 African American Cultural Heritage Exhibit. Electronic document, http://southwestmemphis.com/african-american- cultural-heritage/, accessed April 27, 2015.
- Herreman, Yani 2004 Display Exhibits and Exhibitions. In Running a Museum: A Practical Handbook edited by the International Council of Museums, pp. 91-104. ICOM, Paris.
- Hirzy, Elizabeth 2002 Mastering Civic Engagement: A Report from the American Association of Museums. In Mastering Civic Engagement: A Challenge to Museums, edited by the American Association of Museums, pp. 9-20. American Association of Museums, Washington, D.C. McDavid, Carol 2003 Collaboration, Power, and the Internet: The Public Archaeology of the Levi Jordan Plantation. In Archaeologists and Local Communities: Partners in Exploring the Past, edited by Linda Derry and Maureen Malloy, pp. 45-66. SAA Press, Washington, D.C. Merriman, Nick 2004 Introduction. In Public Archaeology, edited by Nick Merriman, pp. 1-17. Routledge, London.
- Parman, Alice, and Jeffrey Flowers 2008 Exhibit Makeovers. AltaMira Press, New York.
- Serrell, Beverly 1996 Exhibit Labels: An Interpretive Approach. AltaMira Press, New York.
- Simon, Nina 2010 The Participatory Museum. Museum 2.0, Santa Cruz Tate, Natalye B. 2012 Museums as Third Places or What? Accessing the Social without Reservations. Museums and Social Issues 7(2):269-283.
- Worts, Douglas 2006 Measuring Museum Meaning: A Critical Assessment Framework. Journal of Museum Education 31(1):41-49.
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Westmont, V. C. (2022) · International Journal of Historical Archaeology · doi:10.1007/s10761-021-00592-w · Cited by 12 · see citing works
Vargas, J. C. G., Fabregat, R., Carrillo-Ramos, A., & Jové, T. (2025) · Discover Applied Sciences · doi:10.1007/s42452-025-07842-0 · Cited by 5 · see citing works
- Authors
- Connolly, R.
- Affiliations
- University of Memphis (US)
- Corresponding author
- Connolly, Robert
- Venue
- Advances in Archaeological Practice
- Publisher
- Cambridge University Press (CUP)
- Published
- 2015-08
- Volume
- 3
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 188-197
- ISSN
- 2326-3768 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2569972278
- Cited by
- 9
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2025: 2 · 2023: 2 · 2021: 1 · 2018: 1 · 2015: 3
- FWCI
- 30.75
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Advances in Archaeological Practice (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Museology › Museums and Cultural Heritage
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Archeology › Cultural Heritage Management and Preservation
- Social Sciences › Cultural Studies › Archaeology and Cultural Heritage
- Keywords
- co-creation, museum practice, archaeological collections, collection curation, citizen participation, museum relevance, cultural heritage preservation, research accessibility
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