What Makes a Wasteland? A Contemporary Archaeology of Urban Waste Sites

Abstract In this article, I undertake an archaeology of urban “wastelands.” In doing so I ask how such places are materially and conceptually “made” and examine the effects that such labeling has on how postindustrial urban sites are used and valued. Taking examples from the capital cities of England and Scotland (London and Edinburgh), I show that the meaning of “waste” at such sites is temporally and socially contingent. Establishing certainty between which landscapes are “wasted” and which are not can prove difficult, and, in some cases, archaeologists themselves may be implicated in labeling and then “cleansing” wastelands, with archaeology operating as a form of waste management. While wastelands may appear as dissonant and associated with negativity or decay at first glance, I show that these places can also facilitate surprisingly generative and creative uses and provide new forms of heritage value.