Innovation, Impact and Consultancy

Colleagues across HCA work alongside public, cultural, policy and commercial partners internationally with the aim of making the world a better place.

Evidence-based scholarship about the past is vital for understanding and addressing present-day issues and challenges. Colleagues across HCA are passionate in their approach to research impact and engaging the public in their work.

 

If you are interested in working with colleagues in the School, please contact HCA-research@ed.ac.uk and we will direct your enquiry appropriately. See our laboratories page for information on facilities, expertise and opportunities to work with our archaeology laboratories. 

We undertake historical and archaeological consultancy grounded in rigorous, independent research. This includes work for governments and public bodies, contributing evidence-based expertise to policy development, cultural governance and international frameworks. Staff also act as expert consultants in legal and quasi-legal contexts, providing historical and archaeological analysis for cases involving restitution, provenance, memory, and contested pasts. 


Research in the School reaches wide public audiences through podcasts, television documentaries and news media, and many colleagues write prize-winning trade and general-interest books. Our centres for Historical Reconstruction Research and the History and Games Lab mean we lead the sector as historical advisors for games, film, television and documentary productions, supporting responsible and creative representations of the past.  


Colleagues work with teachers, schools and educational organisations to support accurate, research-informed approaches to teaching the past, including contested histories and areas where examples from the past can facilitate difficult conversations about the present. We co-create research with communities, particularly where histories have been marginalised, silenced or disputed. Through long-term partnerships, colleagues work with communities to reclaim, interpret and share their past.


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