ABSTRACT
American Veterans Archaeological Recovery (AVAR) has adapted the original concept of utilising archaeological fieldwork to increase the mental health of military veterans in order to achieve long-term, sustainable, positive impact. This aim has been both to adapt the programme to the unique American veteran service environment, and to ensure that programme outputs meet the needs expressed by veteran participants. Crafting a programme that benefits participants rather than the professional facilitators has involved a significant change to AVAR's philosophy and operating methods, to include codifying and defining the practice as Rehabilitation Archaeology in order to differentiate it from other types of community and public archaeology programmes that do not claim to benefit mental health. The following chapter will define AVAR's audience and the reasons behind this operational shift.
