The heritage of Brexit: Roles of the past in the construction of political identities through social media

This article assesses the role of the pre-modern past in the construction of political identities relating to the UK’s membership in the European Union, by examining how materials and ideas from Iron Age to Early Medieval Britain and Europe were leveraged by those who discussed the topic of Brexit in over 1.4 million messages published in dedicated Facebook pages. Through a combination of data-intensive and qualitative investigations of textual data, we identify the ‘heritages’ invoked in support of pro- or anti-Brexit sentiments. We show how these heritages are centred around myths of origins, resistance and collapse that incorporate tensions and binary divisions. We highlight the strong influence of past expert practices in shaping such deeply entrenched dualistic thinking and reflect over the longue durée agency of heritage expertise. This is the first systematic study of public perceptions and experience of the past in contemporary society undertaken through digital heritage research fuelled by big data. The article is thus foundational, contributing significantly to theory in cultural heritage studies. It is also the first published work to analyse the role of heritage in the construction of political identities in relation to Brexit, via extensive social research

Digital heritage research re-theorised: ontologies and epistemologies in a world of big data

This article provides the first theoretical treatment of the ontologies and epistemologies of digital heritage research at the time of the interconnected and social web, based on extensive empirical and analytical investigation. We draw on observations and concepts developed while conducting the first study of public experiences of the past that utilised big data – over 1.4 million Facebook posts, comments and replies – to revisit or generate new theory from the ground up. We expect that this will help scholars from a range of fields in the humanities, social and computing sciences who are interested in undertaking digital heritage research to understand the deeper implications of their work, the complexities and limitations of the knowledge they create, and its value in exposing the processes via which heritage is made and assessed

Heritage-based tribalism in Big Data ecologies: Deploying origin myths for antagonistic othering

This article presents a conceptual and methodological framework to study heritage-based tribalism in Big Data ecologies by combining approaches from the humanities, social and computing sciences. We use such a framework to examine how ideas of human origin and ancestry are deployed on Twitter for purposes of antagonistic ‘othering’. Our goal is to equip researchers with theory and analytical tools for investigating divisive online uses of the past in today’s networked societies. In particular, we apply notions of heritage, othering and neo-tribalism, and both data-intensive and qualitative methods to the case of people’s engagements with the news of Cheddar Man’s DNA on Twitter. We show that heritage-based tribalism in Big Data ecologies is uniquely shaped as an assemblage by the coalescing of different forms of antagonistic othering. Those that co-occur most frequently are the ones that draw on ‘Views on Race’, ‘Trust in Experts’ and ‘Political Leaning’. The framings of the news that were most influential in triggering heritage-based tribalism were introduced by both right- and left-leaning newspaper outlets and by activist websites. We conclude that heritage-themed communications that rely on provocative narratives on social media tend to be labelled as political and not to be conducive to positive change in people’s attitudes towards issues such as racism.</jats:p

Developing Transdisciplinary Approaches to Sustainability Challenges: The Need to Model Socio-Environmental Systems in the Longue Durée

Human beings are an active component of every terrestrial ecosystem on Earth. Although our local impact on the evolution of these ecosystems has been undeniable and extensively documented, it remains unclear precisely how our activities are altering them, in part because ecosystems are dynamic systems structured by complex, non-linear feedback processes and cascading effects. We argue that it is only by studying human–environment interactions over timescales that greatly exceed the lifespan of any individual human (i.e., the deep past or longue durée), we can hope to fully understand such processes and their implications. In this article, we identify some of the key challenges faced in integrating long-term datasets with those of other areas of sustainability science, and suggest some useful ways forward. Specifically, we (a) highlight the potential of the historical sciences for sustainability science, (b) stress the need to integrate theoretical frameworks wherein humans are seen as inherently entangled with the environment, and (c) propose formal computational modelling as the ideal platform to overcome the challenges of transdisciplinary work across large, and multiple, geographical and temporal scales. Our goal is to provide a manifesto for an integrated scientific approach to the study of socio-ecological systems over the long term

Developing Transdisciplinary Approaches to Sustainability Challenges: The Need to Model Socio-Environmental Systems in the Longue Durée

Human beings are an active component of every terrestrial ecosystem on Earth. Although our local impact on the evolution of these ecosystems has been undeniable and extensively documented, it remains unclear precisely how our activities are altering them, in part because ecosystems are dynamic systems structured by complex, non-linear feedback processes and cascading effects. We argue that it is only by studying human–environment interactions over timescales that greatly exceed the lifespan of any individual human (i.e., the deep past or longue durée), we can hope to fully understand such processes and their implications. In this article, we identify some of the key challenges faced in integrating long-term datasets with those of other areas of sustainability science, and suggest some useful ways forward. Specifically, we (a) highlight the potential of the historical sciences for sustainability science, (b) stress the need to integrate theoretical frameworks wherein humans are seen as inherently entangled with the environment, and (c) propose formal computational modelling as the ideal platform to overcome the challenges of transdisciplinary work across large, and multiple, geographical and temporal scales. Our goal is to provide a manifesto for an integrated scientific approach to the study of socio-ecological systems over the long term

Modelling spatio-temporal changes in the ecological niches of major domesticated crops in China: Application of Species Distribution Modelling

This thesis explores how the dispersal of crops in the past related to their ecological niches. In particular, it presents the niche models for five historically significant crops in China: rice, millet, wheat, barley and buckwheat. These models are rooted in the Species Distribution Modelling (SDM) methodology and infer the potential areas suitable for the cultivation of each crop from the present distributional data. Model predictions are extrapolated on the palaeoclimatic reconstructions to obtain suitability estimates extending back to the initial uptake of each crop in China. Those are compared against the patterns of crops’ dispersal deduced from archaeobotanical data to assess the contribution of climatic factors and human niche construction to agricultural trajectories. Specifically, the study draws on ecological niche theory, niche construction theory, cultural evolution and gene-culture co-evolutionary theory to interpret how the observed patterns could result from different pathways to niche construction and distributional expansion. The analysis identified two modes of crop dispersal based on whether those pathways involved more deliberate efforts at spreading and maintaining cultivation or passive responses to the environment. Niche-forming characterised major domesticates which originated in China: rice and millet. It manifested in the gradual broadening of the environmental range occupied by the crops over time and was associated with the pathways that implied prioritisation by farmers. In contrast, a stable environmental range identified the niche following trajectories, expected when the spread of crops was more opportunistic than intentional. Foreign domesticates (wheat and barley) and buckwheat, a comparatively minor crop, exemplify this model. Furthermore, the analysis provided insights into factors that shaped the dispersal patterns of individual crops. Notably, it demonstrated that climate constrained buckwheat movement along major transcontinental dispersal routes, followed by crops such as millet, wheat and barley. In conjunction with the niche-following pattern identified for this crop, this provides an explanation for the delayed westwards spread compared to other East Asian domesticates. Furthermore, the models revealed the discrepancy between the high suitability of environmental conditions predicted in northeast China, and the relatively slow pace of agricultural developments documented in the area, opening up a discussion about possible explanatory factors. Finally, the analysis exposed the climatic shift in the inland southern part of the country. The models demonstrated that this shift opened up a corridor of dispersal for millet and might have facilitated the spread of agriculture in this direction

Supplemental Fig1 -Supplemental material for The heritage of Brexit: Roles of the past in the construction of political identities through social media

<p> Supplemental material, Supplemental Fig1 for The heritage of Brexit: Roles of the past in the construction of political identities through social media by Chiara Bonacchi, Mark Altaweel and Marta Krzyzanska in Journal of Social Archaeology </p

Supplemental material for The heritage of Brexit: Roles of the past in the construction of political identities through social media

<p>Supplemental material for The heritage of Brexit: Roles of the past in the construction of political identities through social media by Chiara Bonacchi, Mark Altaweel and Marta Krzyzanska in Journal of Social Archaeology</p

Heritage-of-Brexit

This repo contains code written to extract and analyse Facebook data for the paper: Bonacchi, C., Altaweel, M., Krzyzanska, M. (in press, 2018) 'The Heritage of Brexit: Roles of the past in the construction of political identities through social media'. Journal of Social Archaeology. DOI:10.1177/146960531875971

Supplemental Fig2 -Supplemental material for The heritage of Brexit: Roles of the past in the construction of political identities through social media

<p> Supplemental material, Supplemental Fig2 for The heritage of Brexit: Roles of the past in the construction of political identities through social media by Chiara Bonacchi, Mark Altaweel and Marta Krzyzanska in Journal of Social Archaeology </p