Working with social haunting: past- and present-making in two "communities of value"

Our project examines how the present is 'haunted' by the past in two 'communities of value' with long and sometimes tumultuous histories: the Manchester-based Co-operative College and associated Rochdale Pioneers Museum, and the South Yorkshire community branch of the trade union Unite which operates out of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) in Barnsley. The communities share similar values of mutuality and collectivism and have a keen awareness of their historical identities. However their approaches vary markedly: one is a public-facing heritage site, while the other is a much more obviously politicised activist community.

According to the sociologist Avery Gordon, a social haunting is a reminder and legacy of past social violence. It is a sense, a feeling, a way of thinking, an atmosphere that pervades within a community, influencing its future in myriad, perhaps unnoticed, ways. Our research will explore this concept from an Arts and Humanities perspective, shedding light on the role of architecture, artefacts, landscapes, sounds, poetry and graphic narrative in recalling 'barely visible' historical experiences and exploring the changing nature of community values.

In this project we will, in partnership with our two case study communities, establish two '[Ghost] Co-Labs'. These project-long co-production spaces will bring together members of the project team, our arts collaborators, and community partner members to codesign a programme of activities that develop through phases. These will involve an investigative phase in which participants engage in multi faceted historical research led by an expert in heritage studies and a creative phase in which they use insights gained from these explorations to create arts-based outputs. These outputs will include three collectively-produced arts-based community outcomes: a one hour community radio broadcast formatted in mixed 'collage documentary' and radio art form; a small archive of workshop poetry; a small visual archive of comic strips. Through this process, we aim to attune to the often contested and sometimes barely visible processes of past- and present making that is forming ways in which communal lives are being lived as both our partner organisations and communities reshape and renew themselves in the face of new social challenges.

This Impact Summary identifies a broad range of direct and indirect economic, societal and cultural beneficiaries. The two key beneficiaries will be our named partners (the Co-operative College and the South Yorkshire Community Branch of the trade union UNITE) and other interested parties that they can reach. The Co-operative College is a unique educational institution focussed on providing learning programmes and research to support the development of a successful and diverse co-operative sector. The six co-operative principles are key to its identity. A better understanding of the relation of historical heritage to the present - particularly its barely visible aspects - will strengthen the college's 'future negotiation' during a period of change. Specifically, the Rochdale Pioneers museum will benefit from initial work being carried out in the Co-operative College's archive and from the project creative arts products that will be inspired by the archive and the the National Co-operative Archive collection itself will benefit from holding the project archive. Importantly, the Co-operative College's schools network of over 800 schools will potentially benefit from curriculum resources inspired by the creative products that the project produces. The huge impact of co-operative heritage and history in the north of England is well known but further creative activity and research of the kind outlined here will deepen understandings of people, place and identity.

The Co-operative movement is on the cusp of new trajectories with new formations emerging. There are over 6,500 co-operatives in the UK. The College and its sister organisations such as Co-operatives UK will be able to reach communities of interest and disseminate the research and project practice not only nationally but internationally through its website, twitter feed, blogs and newsletters.
As for UNITE the project will help the union to improve its understanding of the way historical matters that go back to the miners' strike of 1984-85 and beyond are still impacting in the local area and its membership. The community outputs will support the organisation in the creative vision of community activism that it is encouraging. For local community participants, the project will be an opportunity to ensure that their voices are heard and recognised; to explore arts-based activities which offer them alternative ways of expressing their stories; to make further connections within their communities through exploring topics which are often not discussed; and to explore what this means for the collective history, and future, of their communities. Activities such as the planned radio broadcast, poetry and comics archives and final 'Ghost Exchange' events will allow local communities to become involved in these explorations.

Beyond immediate impact among our named partners, the following parties will also benefit in terms of knowledge of the project and its outcomes and access to shared and archived materials: The Co-operative College/Unite in Schools Project; Workers' Education Association; CASS School of Community and Education, University of East London; School of Education and Health, Federation University Australia; Radical Arts/Radical Aesthetics network; Experience Barnsley museum; People's History Museum/Working Class Movement Library, Manchester/Salford. Significant and diverse Policy-maker groups who benefit will include Justice for Mineworkers Parliamentary Group; Southwell and Nottingham Diocese. Community groups and organisations benefitting will include: Pitmen Poets, Poets, Mexborough; Co-op, Rochdale; UNITE national education office; UNITE Northern Region community membership; Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign.