The queer archaeology of Green Gate: Interpreting contested space at Greenham Common Airbase (Britain, Cold War)

This paper uses a well-known twentieth-century monument to examine contradi ctions in the material record and how they might be accommodated in protect ion and interpretative schemes at this and similar sites where contested sp ace is represented. The archaeology of the later twentieth century at, and immediately outside, Greenham Common Airbase (Berkshire, England) is descri bed as unconventional and atypical in its associations, mysterious and disq uieting in its later Cold War context, as well as outlandish and unorthodox in what it can hope to achieve in terms of public perception and interpret ation. Protest is the stuff of everyday life, yet it is rarely and barely r ecognised in heritage interpretation, particularly where opposition was dir ectly aimed at the establishment view or government policy. This paper expl ores these related issues.