The role of town memorials: collective memory, counter-memory and forgetting in Barnsley

Memorials are objects and places which serve to remind people of a person or an event. Memorialisation describes the complex process of creating, preserving and altering objects and ceremonies which draw attention to significant figures and historical events. This research brings light to the key themes which define people’s experiences of war memorials and coal mining memorials in Barnsley, a post-industrial Northern town in England. The purpose of this project is to create detailed descriptions of people’s experiences of the roles that memorials have, and to relate these descriptions to scholarly literature around memorials to probe for factors which shape memorialisation. The data for this project was collected using one-to-one interviews and focus groups with 28 Barnsley residents who have experience of organising memorial events. Key themes which underpinned participants’ experiences of memorials included shared conceptualisations and structured group practices. These themes capture how people draw on similar concepts and motivations when memorialising and often memorialise in a set time, place and sequence. Other themes which informed participants’ experiences were repeated triggering events and a sense of direct contact with the past. These themes describe how being repeatedly triggered to remember an event is pivotal to one’s engagement with it, and how the performative elements of some memorialisation practices provide people with a sense of connectedness with the past. Though common themes emerged from participant accounts, clear differences were identified in the ways that people memorialise coal mining history and war history. These findings have implications for the ways local authorities and other powerful entities deliberate on the creation, maintenance and removal of memorials. Furthermore, this study’s findings indicate a need for further exploration of the dynamics and interactions between key memory themes in post-industrial towns in the United Kingdom.