Being Present With the Past by Dr Claire Nolan - the 2025 CBA de Cardi Lecture

Being Present with the Past: Finding meaning through mindful engagement with archaeology

Over the past 20 years, studies have demonstrated that engagement with heritage can facilitate wellbeing in a variety of ways, particularly through involvement in archaeological excavation. However, such heritage-related wellbeing projects require extensive time and resources from both organisations and participants, and may not always be feasible or accessible to everyone. Addressing this issue, this lecture will consider how we might derive wellbeing through engagement with archaeology and heritage in everyday contexts, and how we can find personal meaning by simply being present with the past in the present. Based on research carried out with participants at prehistoric sites in Wiltshire in 2016 and 2017, the lecture will unpack what it is about our direct relationship to heritage assets that creates wellbeing and how reflecting on this connection can facilitate personal insights. Drawing on practices from mindfulness-based cognitive therapy and landscape archaeology, amongst other approaches, it will review some of the methods we can use to enable these insights and ultimately enhance our experience of archaeology.

About the speaker

Claire Nolan is a postdoctoral researcher at University College Cork, Ireland. Claire specialises in public archaeology, cultural heritage and landscape studies. Her recent research has focused on wellbeing and archaeology, in particular, the therapeutic value of the prehistoric landscapes of Avebury, Stonehenge, and the Vale of Pewsey and their power to create meaning for individuals and communities.

This lecture was recorded as part of the Council for British Archaeology's 2025 AGM and de Cardi lecture held online on Saturday 8 Fenruary 2025. 

You can watch the video on the CBA YouTube channel.