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  • Date and time: Saturday 6 June 2026, 11.40am to 12.20pm
  • Location: In-person only
    Heslington Hall, Campus West, University of York (Map)
  • Admission: Free admission, booking required

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Event details

How can heritage help resolve some of the world's most urgent and complex problems?

Join archaeologist John Schofield of the University of York as he explores how heritage practice can help to resolve ‘wicked problems’. These are problems that have many interdependent and conflicting characteristics and seem impossible to solve. For example, climate change, poverty and social injustice.

Based on his book, Wicked Problems for Archaeologists: Heritage as Transformative Practice (Oxford University Press, 2024), John will discuss the potential for heritage studies and heritage practice to help to better manage our wicked futures. John will reveal how, by working with communities and in creative ways across disciplines, heritage practitioners (including archaeologists) can play an important and distinct role in finding ‘small wins’ solutions to these wicked problems.

Come along and discover how small wins can represent incremental successes that help to build momentum and drive progress towards problem solving.


‘Wicked for Good: Heritage solutions’ is one of a number of events taking place as part of a special edition of YorkTalks. Celebrating University of York’s research at its best, we invite you to explore a dynamic landscape of curated talks, live performances and hands-on activities staged in the historic Heslington Hall and its grounds on the theme Heritage Reframed. 

About the speaker

Professor John Schofield is Director of Studies in Cultural Heritage Management in the Archaeology Department at the University of York (UK). He also holds adjunct positions at Griffith and Flinders universities (Australia) and is Docent in Contemporary Archaeology and Cultural Heritage at the University of Turku (Finland). John is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London, a Corresponding Fellow of the Australian Humanities Academy, a member of the Punk Scholars Network, and a Member of the Chartered Institute for Archaeologists. He has previously served as Executive Editor of the Taylor and Francis journal World Archaeology.

Partners

YorkTalks University of York

Venue details

  • Wheelchair accessible