Taboo and sensitive heritage: labour camps, burials and the role of activism in the Channel Islands

In this article we propose the concept of taboo heritage as a way to describe a legacy of war so sensitive that it never undergoes heritage creation. Attempts at creation, such as heritage listing, renovation or excavation, are blocked by local authorities. We also examine the transition from taboo heritage to sensitive heritage, the next step along the ‘heritage continuum’, which we propose can only occur through the combined efforts of the passage of time, the role of activists and official authorisation. We take as our case study two of the British Channel Islands of Jersey and Alderney, occupied by German forces from 1940 to 1945. Labour camps were built in both islands, where the dead were also buried locally. We explore how the existing legacy of these events is still taboo heritage in Alderney, but has achieved partial progress in the transition to sensitive heritage in Jersey.British Academy; McDonald Institute for Archaeological Researc

“This is proof”? Forensic evidence and ambiguous material culture at Treblinka extermination camp

In recent years, a forensic archaeological project at Treblinka extermination camp has uncovered significance evidence relating to the mass murder that took place there. A number of questions emerged regarding the provenance and origins of objects discovered as part of this work, and why they had remained undiscovered for over seventy years. These discoveries led to an opportunity to confirm and challenge the history of the extermination camp, and demands (from the public) to view the objects. This paper will outline how archaeologists and artists came together to reflect on these issues, whilst simultaneously providing access to the new findings

Taboo and sensitive heritage: labour camps, burials and the role of activism in the Channel Islands

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Taylor & Francis via http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13527258.2016.1191524In this article we propose the concept of taboo heritage as a way to describe a legacy of war so sensitive that it never undergoes heritage creation. Attempts at creation, such as heritage listing, renovation or excavation, are blocked by local authorities. We also examine the transition from taboo heritage to sensitive heritage, the next step along the ‘heritage continuum’, which we propose can only occur through the combined efforts of the passage of time, the role of activists and official authorisation. We take as our case study two of the British Channel Islands of Jersey and Alderney, occupied by German forces from 1940 to 1945. Labour camps were built in both islands, where the dead were also buried locally. We explore how the existing legacy of these events is still taboo heritage in Alderney, but has achieved partial progress in the transition to sensitive heritage in Jersey.This work was supported by both the British Academy [grant number SG142541] and the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research (for the fieldwork in Jersey) and Staffordshire University (for the fieldwork in Alderney)

PANORAMIC IMAGES, 2D FEATURE-BASED AND CHANGE DETECTION METHODS FOR THE DOCUMENTATION OF CONTAMINATED CRIME SCENES

This paper aims to propose and validate a methodology which can support forensic technicians while documenting a crime scene, after a contamination event (either accidental or deliberate) has changed its original appearance. Indeed, investigators need fast and automated tools to detect changes that occurred at a scene over time, and solutions to this problem are still an open issue. The contribution of the paper for addressing this need is twofold. First, a new methodology is introduced, that exploits panoramic images acquired with the Ricoh Theta SC camera, and 2D feature-based methods. The core idea is that SIFT features inherently contain scene information and, thanks to their good stability and invariance, can be exploited to detect possible changes that occurred at a scene surveyed with multi-temporal images. Second, in order to evaluate the performance of the proposed methodology, a reference approach is applied, based on state-of-the-art change detection algorithms (MAF/MAD), originally developed for remote sensing applications. Both methods are tested by simulating a typical crime scene, and a contamination event at the Crime Scene House (UK)

A LOW-COST PANORAMIC CAMERA FOR THE 3D DOCUMENTATION OF CONTAMINATED CRIME SCENES

Crime scene documentation is a fundamental task which has to be undertaken in a fast, accurate and reliable way, highlighting evidence which can be further used for ensuring justice for victims and for guaranteeing the successful prosecution of perpetrators. The main focus of this paper is on the documentation of a typical crime scene and on the rapid recording of any possible contamination that could have influenced its original appearance. A 3D reconstruction of the environment is first generated by processing panoramas acquired with the low-cost Ricoh Theta 360 camera, and further analysed to highlight potentials and limits of this emerging and consumer-grade technology. Then, a methodology is proposed for the rapid recording of changes occurring between the original and the contaminated crime scene. The approach is based on an automatic 3D feature-based data registration, followed by a cloud-to-cloud distance computation, given as input the 3D point clouds generated before and after e.g. the misplacement of evidence. All the algorithms adopted for panoramas pre-processing, photogrammetric 3D reconstruction, 3D geometry registration and analysis, are presented and currently available in open-source or low-cost software solutions

PANORAMIC IMAGES, 2D FEATURE-BASED AND CHANGE DETECTION METHODS FOR THE DOCUMENTATION OF CONTAMINATED CRIME SCENES

This paper aims to propose and validate a methodology which can support forensic technicians while documenting a crime scene, after a contamination event (either accidental or deliberate) has changed its original appearance. Indeed, investigators need fast and automated tools to detect changes that occurred at a scene over time, and solutions to this problem are still an open issue. The contribution of the paper for addressing this need is twofold. First, a new methodology is introduced, that exploits panoramic images acquired with the Ricoh Theta SC camera, and 2D feature-based methods. The core idea is that SIFT features inherently contain scene information and, thanks to their good stability and invariance, can be exploited to detect possible changes that occurred at a scene surveyed with multi-temporal images. Second, in order to evaluate the performance of the proposed methodology, a reference approach is applied, based on state-of-the-art change detection algorithms (MAF/MAD), originally developed for remote sensing applications. Both methods are tested by simulating a typical crime scene, and a contamination event at the Crime Scene House (UK)

A low-cost panoramic camera for the 3D documentation of contaminated crime scenes

Crime scene documentation is a fundamental task which has to be undertaken in a fast, accurate and reliable way, highlighting evidence which can be further used for ensuring justice for victims and for guaranteeing the successful prosecution of perpetrators. The main focus of this paper is on the documentation of a typical crime scene and on the rapid recording of any possible contamination that could have influenced its original appearance. A 3D reconstruction of the environment is first generated by processing panoramas acquired with the low-cost Ricoh Theta 360 camera, and further analysed to highlight potentials and limits of this emerging and consumer-grade technology. Then, a methodology is proposed for the rapid recording of changes occurring between the original and the contaminated crime scene. The approach is based on an automatic 3D feature-based data registration, followed by a cloud-to-cloud distance computation, given as input the 3D point clouds generated before and after e.g. the misplacement of evidence. All the algorithms adopted for panoramas pre-processing, photogrammetric 3D reconstruction, 3D geometry registration and analysis, are presented and currently available in open-source or low-cost software solutions