Cultural Heritage on the Web: Applied Digital Visual Anthropology and Local Cultural Property Rights Discourse

2012 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 345-369 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate Hennessy

AbstractThe 2003 UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage specifies that communities are to be full partners in efforts to safeguard their intangible cultural heritage. Yet the notion of safeguarding has been complicated by the politics and mechanisms of digital circulation. Based on fieldwork in British Columbia and Thailand, I show that community-based productions of multimedia aimed at documenting, transmitting, and revitalizing intangible heritage are productive spaces in which local cultural property rights discourses are initiated and articulated. I argue that digital heritage initiatives can support decision making about the circulation—or restriction—of digital cultural heritage while drawing attention to the complexities of safeguarding heritage in the digital age.

Author(s):  
Francioni Francesco

The concept of ‘world heritage’ was legally codified by the 1972 UNESCO Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage (WHC). This convention occupies a special position in the ever-expanding body of international cultural heritage law. This is for three fundamental reasons. First, with its 193 States Parties, it is a truly universal treaty in force for the protection of cultural heritage. Second, it represents a major innovation by its unprecedented approach that brings together cultural properties and natural sites of exceptional importance, both subject to the same system of international cooperation for their identification, delineation, and protection. Third, this convention has contributed to the reconceptualization of ‘cultural property’, paving the way for its dynamic evolution into the more comprehensive concept of ‘cultural heritage’, understood as the inherited patrimony of culture—inclusive of the intangible heritage and living culture of relevant human communities.


Author(s):  
Jorijn Neyrinck ◽  
Ellen Janssens

Documentation of intangible cultural heritage (ICH) poses a series of new questions and challenges within the heritage practice. How do we document a heritage that is alive, through the heads, hands and practices of people? Heritage that is neither tangible nor fixed but intangible and dynamic. Heritage that lives within a community, which by its active practice also acts to transmit and realize a future for this living heritage. Such living heritage processes require different, explicitly participatory and dynamic approaches for documentation – for which audiovisual forms of recording seem appropriate. This article unravels the conceptual confusion between different ‘intangible’ heritage practices and then looks at examples of practice in Flanders and in existing related research methods such as visual anthropology and oral history.


2018 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 515-542
Author(s):  
Harriet Deacon

Abstract:“Traditional” foodways are represented as an important part of cultural heritage in Europe. Two legal instruments aim to play a role in safeguarding them—namely, the Traditional Specialties Guaranteed (TSG) scheme and the 2003 UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage. These instruments are sometimes used in parallel—for example, in the TSG registration for “Pizza Napoletana” and the nomination of “the art of Neapolitan ‘pizzaiuolo’” to one of the lists of the Convention. While recognizing the important role of state actors in this process, this article proposes going beyond a simple “misappropriation” thesis to look at the possible economic effects of registration and inscription.


2021 ◽  
pp. 77-86
Author(s):  
Simone Toji

This article considers some modes of activation and operationalization of the idea of social participation in the field of intangible cultural heritage. It regards the newest proposal of operating participation established by the UNESCO Convention on Safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage and the experience of its implementation in Brazil. By analyzing how the issue of participation was developed through dialogue between the international and national levels, the paper also shows how the emergence of categories of social actors such as “communities” and “bearers” has been consolidated within the mentioned intangible cultural policies.


2021 ◽  
pp. 85-102

This chapter explores the complex and contested relationship between memory and heritage. It covers topics such as notions of authenticity, intangible heritage, and commemoration and museums. Chapter contents: 5.0 Introduction (by Giulio Verdini) 5.1 Grassroots Values and Local Cultural Heritage in China (by Harriet Evans) 5.2 ‘When It Comes to Intangible Cultural Heritage, Everyone Is Always Happy’: Some Thoughts on the Chinese Life of a UNESCO Convention (by Philipp Demgenski) 5.3 Ruins on Ruins: Forgetting, Commemorating, and Re-Forgetting the Third Front (by Paul Kendall) 5.4 Complex Collections, Contentious Memories: Reflections on the Jianchuan Museum Cluster (by Lisheng Zhang)


Pravovedenie ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-56
Author(s):  
Elena Sinibaldi ◽  
◽  
Antonio Parente ◽  

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage has not only introduced a conceptual and applicative expansion of the interdisciplinary subjects applied to cultural heritage, but it has also increasingly encouraged an integrated planning of sustainable development policies for territories and communities that convey and shape their relative cultural and anthropomorphic identity, along with the re-thinking of the collective dimension of heritage in terms of rights to creation and fruition as well as the related cultural management. This article presents a reflection on the opportunity to identify and develop the relationship between tangible and intangible heritage as resources that are essential to one another. To this purpose, two illustrative UNESCO application paths are examined. The first relates to the recognition of The Vineyard Landscape of Piedmont: Langhe-Roero and Monferrato as a Cultural Landscape of World Heritage, pursuant to the 1972 UNESCO Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage, while the second concerns the inscription of the intangible element The Celebration of Celestinian Forgiveness in the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity of the UNESCO 2003 Convention. Due to differences in paradigms and application criteria under the two UNESCO Conventions, which are also detectable in the Italian regulatory context, these case studies offer the opportunity to advance an interdisciplinary reflection aimed at rethinking safeguarding contexts, as well as enhancement and increasing accessibility of cultural heritage. As a result of the reflection, an analysis of the concept of living in relation to the anthropological definition of organic landscape, representation of collective identities (community-based heritage), inclusive places and sociability (public policy), communicative restitution (universal ethical values), participatory management (participative brand making), and integrated sustainability is derived.


Pravovedenie ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 124-137
Author(s):  
Benedetta Ubertazzi ◽  
◽  

The Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (hereafter known as the Convention) was adopted within the framework of UNESCO in October 2003. Article 2 of the Convention establishes that intangible cultural heritage (ICH) must be compatible with sustainable development. Sustainable development in relation to culture consists of three intertwined dimensions: society, environment, and economy. Chapter 6 of the Operational Directives for the Implementation of this Convention establishes a framework related to “environmental sustainability”. The framework consists of three pillars. The first pillar relates to “environmental impacts in the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage”. The second pillar relates to “knowledge and practices concerning nature and the universe”. The final pillar concerns “community-based resilience to natural disasters and climate change”. Through analysis of the Convention, the Convention’s Operational Directives and elements of intangible cultural heritage inscribed on the Representative List of the Convention, this article will provide case studies where, in line with these pillars, intellectual property rights, particularly geographical indications, aim to support environmentally friendly practices. In so doing, this article will also seek to show that intellectual property rights can recognise communities as bearers of knowledge about nature and as essential actors in sustaining the environment. Indeed, this work will suggest that although intellectual property rights, if not carefully drafted, can pose risks for environmental sustainability, when correctly adopted they have the capacity to empower communities. Thus, the aim of this work is to show how intellectual property rights can be tools to facilitate safeguarding and sustainability for both intangible cultural heritage and the environment.


Author(s):  
Gül Aktürk ◽  
Martha Lerski

AbstractClimate change is borderless, and its impacts are not shared equally by all communities. It causes an imbalance between people by creating a more desirable living environment for some societies while erasing settlements and shelters of some others. Due to floods, sea level rise, destructive storms, drought, and slow-onset factors such as salinization of water and soil, people lose their lands, homes, and natural resources. Catastrophic events force people to move voluntarily or involuntarily. The relocation of communities is a debatable climate adaptation measure which requires utmost care with human rights, ethics, and psychological well-being of individuals upon the issues of discrimination, conflict, and security. As the number of climate-displaced populations grows, the generations-deep connection to their rituals, customs, and ancestral ties with the land, cultural practices, and intangible cultural heritage become endangered. However, intangible heritage is often overlooked in the context of climate displacement. This paper presents reflections based on observations regarding the intangible heritage of voluntarily displaced communities. It begins by examining intangible heritage under the threat of climate displacement, with place-based examples. It then reveals intangible heritage as a catalyst to building resilient communities by advocating for the cultural values of indigenous and all people in climate action planning. It concludes the discussion by presenting the implications of climate displacement in existing intangible heritage initiatives. This article seeks to contribute to the emerging policies of preserving intangible heritage in the context of climate displacement.


2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 191-200
Author(s):  
Justyna Łukaszewska‑Haberkowa

In the first part of this paper the definition of the protection of intangible cul­tural heritage is introduced, based on the 2003 UNESCO Convention as well as the Polish legislation concerning the protection of items on the national list of intangible culture. The second part shortly characterizes the Krakow bob­bin lace tradition along with its guardians, both present and past. In the third part it is systematically described what is being done to protect the tradition and craft in the Podgórze Culture Center thanks to the initiatives undertaken by certain guardians, and in the Historical Museum of the City of Krakow.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document