Safeguarding Tangible Heritage in Socially Deprived Areas: The Role Played by a Small Museum

Exponents of Critical Heritage studies maintain that people, communities, events, and places linked with the class are often underrepresented and misrepresented by dominant discourse. Working-class communities tend to erased from official history or portrayed in a negative light. This article concerns the role played by a social history to promote social inclusion through representation made for and with a community faced by detrimental , social, and political social changes. Cultural reclamation is crucial for communities that bear the brunt of and the consequent loss of power, leading to social and economic dislocation. Changes in the world’s economy have endangered many of these communities. These changes also threaten the heritage that provide social groups with a positive sense of place and identity since low-income areas are often perceived as blighted, in of bulldozer renewal by urban planners. This participatory action research demonstrates that circumstances may social history museums to go beyond education and embrace social activism in an effort to bring about social .