Call for participation: Network of Researchers on Heritagisations
Dec 22nd, 2009 by roryturner
I’m reposting this from H-Folk, an academic folklore listserve I am on.
Some of you may find this interesting, certainly the term heritigisation is thought provoking:
The notion of heritage is surely one of the best tools social scientists
have at their disposal to analyse how societies deal with their past,
especially regarding their complex and ambiguous relationship with history
and memory. However, heritage is also a way of constructing our present and
locality, in transnational contexts as much as in local communities.The recent concepts of Biodiversity, Cultural Diversity or Intangible
Cultural Heritage proposed by Unesco to defend non-architectural heritage
have met with considerable success, reinforce the centrality of such
principles as loss, safeguard, and development that have already changed the
social and economic landscapes of sites classified as World Heritage.However, critical views on heritagisation are strikingly uncommon because
heritage, either material, natural or immaterial, is often looked upon as
authentic or irreducible civilisational testimony, as well as a real
powerful tourism-related tool of economic development. Heritage is generally
studied and used by specialists in charge of it (curators, politicians,
economic agents or associations) as a « corpus »* per se*, to be considered
and valorised as a mere ‘civilisational trace’ , cut off from the social,
historical and cultural context that produced it. The constitution of museum
collections or the publication of Unesco’s world heritage lists are
nevertheless the result of an act of classification whose criteria are as
much reliant on cultural and historical factors and the people involved in
selecting and manipulating heritage, as it has been observed in other social
phenomena, such as kinship, religion and economy.In other words, the potential elevation of natural, material and immaterial
items to a heritage status – and the effects this may have – must be taken
and analysed as a social fact like any other. The recent development of
heritage studies inside academia and the growing interest in heritage
outside of it offer an ideal opportunity to think heritagisation as a social
practice and a world view, inscribed in the bricolage dynamics that we find
thriving between the global and the local, between history, memory and
identity.In fact, a growing number of researchers (at doctoral and postdoctoral
level, but not only) are today engaged in interrogating heritage objects and
practices within the humanities (archeology, history, political sciences,
geography, anthropology, etc.).The Network of Researchers on Heritagisations, its blog (
respatrimoni.wordpress.com) and its mailing list (
groups.google.fr/group/respatrimoni) aim to provide easy access to
information and updated news (supplied by its members). All announcements
concerning conferences, calls for papers, publication opportunities, job
offers, courses, symposiums and workshops should be sent to
res.patrimoni@gmail.com to be posted on the blog and sent to the mailing
list. The relevance and liveliness of the blog depends entirely on the
members’ shared commitment to exchange information, so we encourage all to
participate.A directory of the members is also under construction. If you wish to be
part of it, send us a short biographical note (of no more than 10 lines),
including your contact details, publications and main research interests.More than 100 people have joined the network – from students, PhD. holders,
academic teachers and researchers to professionals of the curation field.
With your help and active participation we hope to make this network a solid
base for the development of an open, collective and critical reflection on
heritage and heritage-related issues.Contact: res.patrimoni@gmail.com
—
Cyril Isnart
Investigador Auxiliar Convidado
Universidade de Évora
Centro Interdisciplinar de História, Culturas e Sociedades
Palácio do Vimioso
Apartado 94
7002-554 Évora
Portugalhttp://respatrimoni.wordpress.com/
Wow, thanks for the info, this looks like a potentially fascinating network, I like the idea of heritagisation, reminds me a lot of the concepts in Robert Hewison’s book “The Heritage Industry” which was such a big deal in the UK, brilliant book by the way for anyone who hasn’t read it.
Also, just as a passing note, you should probably break up their email address so the spammers don’t destroy it! For example I’m going to repost it as: res.patrimoni[at]gmail[dot]com
Cheers,
Dan
[...] on Heritagisations by dancull I’d like to bring your attention to something I found on Cultural Sustainability Blog, which in turn was reposted from the H-Folk, an academic folklore listserve. An announcement of the [...]