A Knowledge Transfer project led by Professor Mike Wilson and Sophie Leslie from the University of Glamorgan set out to gather the oral narrative heritage of Welsh cricket and to explore the use of digital technology as a way of turning those narratives into artefacts and making them available to the broader community. The project coincided with a £9.6m redevelopment of the cricket ground at Sophia Gardens to turn it into the new 16,000 seater SWALEC stadium. Part of that redevelopment is a new Museum of Welsh Cricket which will house a mixture of objects, interactive displays and digital artefacts, towards which this project contributed.
Impacts included:
• Enhancing the visitor experience through new methods of display, and so developing cultural and social benefits for visitors.
• Supporting visitors in considering their own stories through the development of a constantly growing archive, populated by and accessible to visitors. This will benefit the quality of life by encouraging visitors to value their own histories and their links to the wider community.
• Drawing in visitors to the Museum of Welsh Cricket, and so creating financial benefits for the museum and the local area.
• Providing material to feed into the National Curriculum.
Stories and memories of players, spectators, umpires, scorers, tea ladies and groundstaff were collected in the form of video interviews, audio interviews, written accounts and digital stories. Along the way, the team collected almost a thousand photographs documenting cricket in Wales from the late nineteenth century onwards. These images are now held on a website as a resource for anyone wishing to participate in the project.
Stories will be on display in the Museum via monitors, as well as on the TaleEnders™ website. There will also be the opportunity for visitors to respond with stories of their own so that the archive becomes a constantly growing and living resource. Some of the stories may also be broadcast over the big in-ground screen during a season’s matches, and the project will have a major presence as part of the Ashes Exhibition that will take place (with the real Ashes) in Cardiff during summer 2009.
Further information:
These short overviews have been produced as an aid to understanding some of the impacts arising from arts and humanities research. The examples are taken from existing AHRC projects, ranging from small awards up to large Research Grants and Centres. They are not exhaustive; impact from research takes many forms. It can occur at any stage of the research process, from its beginning to well after the research itself has finished.
The Research Councils define impact as the demonstrable contribution that excellent research makes to society and the economy. This definition accords with the Royal Charters of the Councils and with HM Treasury guidance on the appraisal of economic impact. Impact embraces all the extremely diverse ways in which research-related knowledge and skills benefit individuals, organisations and nations by:
• fostering global economic performance, and specifically the economic competitiveness of the United Kingdom
• increasing the effectiveness of public services and policy, and
• enhancing quality of life, health and creative output
These case studies offer some, but in no way all, of the diversity and variety of those impacts. They are not, however, intended as guidance on completing the Impact Requirements sections on proposals, for which you should refer to the Je-S guidance for Standard Grant proposals and Fellowship proposals.
It should also be remembered that the impacts described here will not necessarily be replicated by undertaking the same activities. The pathways to impact are as diverse and varied as the impacts themselves. These examples can, however, provide some illustration of what can be achieved.