Heritage Work: the Preservations and Performances of Thames Sailing Barges

‘Heritage’ represents a series of contested and contingent relationships in the preservation and performance of the past. It is a relationship made all the more complex by taking into account the work that goes into both aspects: preserving what would otherwise be lost, and actively seeking public exposure and support. Work has been central to studies of heritage practices in the context of deindustrialisation: how working identities and communities use or become used in the development of heritage-led regeneration. This article examines what it is to engage in forms of work defined by their personal, community and commercial heritage appeal. It presents a study of those who live and work on Thames sailing barges – historic cargo vessels whose future survival relies on the impetus to preserve them as part of an industrial heritage, and in their fulfilment of a number of (often problematic) performative roles.