scholarly journals Designing ‘Critical’ Heritage Experiences: Immersion, Enchantment and Autonomy

2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin J. Sterling
Keyword(s):  
Experience Design ◽  
Heritage Sites ◽  
The Past ◽  
Emerging Trends ◽  
Heritage Studies ◽  
Experiential Design ◽  
Moral Model ◽  
Critical Heritage ◽  
Heritage Interpretation ◽  
Point Of Departure

This article investigates the critical potential of newly emerging approaches to heritage experience design. Moving away from a familiar critique of heritage experiences as inauthentic or overly commercial, I consider three aspects of the experiential that might (re)shape critical engagements with the past in the present. Building on the work of Kidd ( 2018 ), the first engages with the growing trend for ‘immersive’ experiences in museums and heritage sites. The second draws on Perry’s notion of archaeological ‘enchantment’ (2019) as a new ‘moral model’ for the field. The third applies Bishop’s ( 2012 ) reading of artistic ‘autonomy’ to specially designed heritage experiences. These concepts are then explored in relation to Critical Heritage Studies and tested against four micro case studies that engage in different ways with the experience of heritage. The theorisation put forward here serves as a point of departure for the two-year research project New Trajectories in Curatorial Experience Design (Feb 19–Jan 21), which aims to document and analyse emerging trends in experiential design within the heritage sector. In particular, this position paper highlights specific points of intervention where new forms of critical-creative practice might open up heritage interpretation to alternative experiential strategies and outcomes.

scholarly journals Heritage - public and expert discourse in the process of heritigization

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 73-82
Author(s):  
Kornelia Kajda
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Historical Events ◽  
Natural Heritage ◽  
The Public ◽  
Heritage Sites ◽  
Białowieża Forest ◽  
The Past ◽  
Heritage Studies ◽  
Polish Society ◽  
The Subject

The debate about “Who owns the past?” has been and still is the subject heated discussion in heritage studies. Deciding what should be protected and what needs special social and governmental attention triggers many questions which are often met with equivocal answers. This article concentrates on a phenomenon framed as heritagization in relevant scholarship. The first section is devoted to the situations in which experts notify the public about the importance of places and historical events. Four case-studies will be discussed. The first two will touch upon cultural and natural heritage sites (Jewish and German heritage in Poland and Rospuda Valley) and show how a group of experts can influence Polish society to build a positive atmosphere around neglected heritage in Poland. The next two case-studies (communist heritage in Poland and Białowieża Forest) present how the situation of conflict between experts and the public may influence the way in which heritage is understood by the society. The case studies will also show how the public renegotiates the meaning of heritage and designates what should be preserved.

scholarly journals Mattias Legnér, Securitizing the past: a discussion on the connections between heritage and security

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-23
Keyword(s):  
Security Studies ◽  
Security Policies ◽  
Critical Reading ◽  
The Balkans ◽  
Heritage Sites ◽  
The Past ◽  
Heritage Studies ◽  
Heritage Politics ◽  
Policies And Practices

Are there connections between security policies, peacebuilding, and heritage politics? The first aim of this paper is to discuss how heritage policies sometimes are used to add to and reinforce security policies and practices. This issue is largely unknown and remains to be researched. Secondly, it would also be of importance to try to better understand how security policies may be influenced by notions of heritage and certain interventions on heritage sites. It is argued that it has become necessary to move beyond the study of wars to better understand how heritage affects security and vice versa not only in conflicts but also in peacetime and in “afterwar” periods. The paper builds on a critical reading of previous research mainly on heritage studies and partly on security studies, and on a case study of Swedish-led heritage interventions in the Balkans following the Yugoslavian wars.

Heritage and the Use of the Past in East Africa

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Giblin
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Cultural Production ◽  
Heritage Management ◽  
Eastern Africa ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
The Past ◽  
Heritage Studies ◽  
Critical Heritage

This article outlines historical and ongoing uses of the past and academic heritage research into those activities within eastern Africa. The use of the past will be discussed as a deep historical practice in the area that is the EAC in the 21st century, demonstrating how political elites have constructed versions of the past to suit contemporary and future aims for hundreds of years. Then there is an outline of the colonial introduction of formalized Western heritage institutions and legislation in the early 20th century, the subsequent nationalization of these in the mid-20th century, and the late-20th- and early-21st-century internationalization of heritage. These overviews are followed by a discussion of different approaches to heritage research including early studies of museums, traditions, heritage management, archaeological introspections, and more recent “critical heritage studies,” which interrogate the use of the past as a form of cultural production.

scholarly journals Digesting the Finnish Nature and Past: Food, Pastness, and the Naturalness of the National in the Wiki-Inventory for Living Heritage

2021 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-111
Author(s):  
Heidi Henriikka Mäkelä
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Heritage ◽  
Cultural Diversity ◽  
Theoretical Background ◽  
Intangible Cultural Heritage ◽  
The Past ◽  
Complex Processes ◽  
Heritage Studies ◽  
Critical Heritage ◽  
The Ideal

Abstract This article examines the inventorying of Finnish intangible cultural heritage with regard to UNESCO’s Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage. I analyse the participatory Wiki-inventory for Living Heritage, concentrating on entries that discuss food and foodways to study how food, materiality, and the national intertwine with practices of producing intangible cultural heritage. The article’s theoretical background draws from the fields of banal nationalism and critical heritage studies. Food is eminently important in narratives of Finnishness: by using the concepts of naturalness and pastness, I show how Finnish food becomes interpreted as ‘authentic’ Finnish heritage. The concepts illuminate the complex processes in which the materiality of food, the Finnish terroir and landscape, narratives of the past, and the consumer who prepares, eats, and digests the heritagised food are tied to each other. These processes reinforce the banality of Finnishness, although the practices of inventorying paradoxically strive for the ideal of cultural diversity that UNESCO promotes.

Politicising dark tourism sites: evidence from Cyprus

2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 175-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna Farmaki ◽  
Katerina Antoniou
Keyword(s):  
Peace Building ◽  
Dark Tourism ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Heritage Sites ◽  
The Past ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
National Museums ◽  
Heritage Interpretation ◽  
Advance Knowledge

Purpose This paper aims to extend understanding on how the tourist experience at dark heritage sites is directed and consequently influences the narratives of cultural heritage. By discussing the way dark heritage sites are projected by suppliers, the paper anticipates to advance knowledge on the nexus between dark tourism and heritage and to offer insights into the management of dissonant heritage sites. Design/methodology/approach The cases of two opposing national museums in the divided island of Cyprus are presented and discussed in an attempt to illustrate how dissonant heritage interpretation in a post-conflict context is often the product of political direction, commemorating the past and to a great extent influencing the future of a society. Findings National struggle museums represent dark heritage sites, which evoke emotions pertinent to ethnic identity reinforcement. Evidently, the management of such sites is in opposition to peace-building efforts taking place in a post-conflict context. The paper concludes that visitation to dark heritage sites is culturally driven rather than death-related and suggests that efforts consolidate to target specific segments of visitors, if the reconciliation potential of dark tourism is to be unleashed. Originality/value Insofar, minimal attention has been paid on the conditions of the supply of dark heritage sites and the role of suppliers in influencing culture-based issues including collective memory and national identity. This paper addresses this gap in literature and advances understanding on the developmental elements defining dark heritage tourism, by identifying and discussing trajectories between dark tourism and politics.

scholarly journals Re-thinking the validity of the past. Deconstructing what authenticity and integrity mean to the fruition of cultural heritage

2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Juan Antonio García-Esparza
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Heritage ◽  
Visual Experience ◽  
Fundamental Issue ◽  
Ongoing Debate ◽  
The Past ◽  
Built Heritage ◽  
Heritage Studies ◽  
Inside View ◽  
Critical Heritage ◽  
Heritage Discourse

<p class="Abstracttext-VITRUVIO"><span lang="EN-GB">There is a lively ongoing debate on Critical Heritage Studies and the Authorised Heritage Discourse, but quite a few authors have viewed the issue from a canonical perspective where the wider Cultural Built Heritage visual experience is assessed and valued in relation with authenticity and integrity. The terms static authenticity and dynamic authenticity appear in this text as dependent on heritage connectivity. Two main arguments are developed in this study. Firstly, a general overview of the context is proposed in order to understand the vernacular internationally. Secondly, the article offers an inside view intended to provide an accurate interpretation of how the vernacular is scrutinised and understood. A fundamental issue discussed in this paper is how cultural heritage is ruled, protected, enhanced, experienced and managed on different scales.</span></p>

scholarly journals Collective Immersion by Affections

2021 ◽  
Vol 28 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Cecilia Trenter ◽  
David Ludvigsson ◽  
Martin Stolare
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Peer Culture ◽  
Heritage Sites ◽  
Heritage Site ◽  
Heritage Studies ◽  
Critical Heritage ◽  
Group Interviews ◽  
Immediate Experience ◽  
Historical Sites ◽  
Stock Of Knowledge

This article explores, through group-interviews and in terms of peer-culture, the ways in which pupils negotiate experiences from school-excursions to three heritage sites, Vadstena Castle, a former Royal Castle connected to the royal dynasty of Vasa; Witches’ forest, the place for interrogation by torture and executions of nine women, accused of witchcraft in 1617, and Linköping Cathedral Ages at the visitor programs “Middle Ages in the Cathedral”. The article, which is part of a larger project on learning processes and historical sites, investigates how pupils collectively load the heritage site with values reflected in immersion by affections, and what significance immersion of affections can have on the pupils’ process of stock of knowledge. The following research questions are asked: What kind of affections are evoked? Which situations and circumstances during the visit at the heritage site, mould impressions and immersion in the collective recalling? By drawing on affection, peer culture and critical heritage studies’ verb “heritaging”, we have studied how the pupils collectively load the heritage sites with values reflected in immersion by affections, and what significance immersion of affections have on the pupils’ process of historical understanding. To understand how the heritage site in terms of a material and physical place loaded with narratives of the past affects the children, the analysis aimed to explore under what circumstances the immersion took place. The article localize three situations that led to surprise and thereby friction between the expected (the stock of knowledge) and what was experienced at the site (the immediate experience), namely conflicts caused by expectations and experiences at the site, conflict caused by replicas in relation to originals, and finally conflict between lived experiences and insights at the site.

scholarly journals Reviewing Neighborhood Sustainability Assessment Tools through Critical Heritage Studies

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 1605 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luciane Aguiar Borges ◽  
Feras Hammami ◽  
Josefin Wangel
Keyword(s):  
Sustainability Assessment ◽  
Assessment Tools ◽  
Neighborhood Design ◽  
Formal Knowledge ◽  
Informal Knowledge ◽  
Heritage Studies ◽  
Critical Heritage ◽  
Sustainability Assessment Tools ◽  
Point Of Departure ◽  
Neighborhood Assessment

This article reports on a critical review of how cultural heritage is addressed in two internationally well-known and used neighborhood assessment tools (NSAs): BREEAM Communities (BREEAM-C) and LEED Neighborhood Design (LEED-ND). The review was done through a discourse analysis in which critical heritage studies, together with a conceptual linking of heritage to sustainability, served as the point of departure. The review showed that while aspects related to heritage are present in both NSAs, heritage is re-presented as primarily being a matter of safeguarding material expressions of culture, such as buildings and other artifacts, while natural elements and immaterial-related practices are disregarded. Moreover, the NSAs institutionalize heritage as a field of formal knowledge and expert-dominated over the informal knowledge of communities.

scholarly journals Gendering the military past: Understanding heritage and security from a feminist perspective

2021 ◽  
pp. 001083672110078
Author(s):  
Cecilia Åse ◽  
Maria Wendt
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Feminist Perspective ◽  
Historical Narratives ◽  
Heritage Sites ◽  
Gender Binary ◽  
Heritage Studies ◽  
Summer Homes ◽  
Critical Heritage ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military

This article showcases how a feminist perspective provides novel insights into the relations between military heritage/history and national security politics. We argue that analysing how gender and sexualities operate at military heritage sites reveals how these operations dis/encourage particular understandings of security and limit the range of acceptable national protection policies. Two recent initiatives to preserve the military heritage of the Cold War period in Sweden are examined: the Cold War exhibits at Air Force Museum in Linköping and the redevelopment of a formerly sealed off military compound at Bungenäs, where bunkers have been remade into exclusive summer homes. By combining feminist international relations and critical heritage studies, we unpack the material, affective and embodied underpinnings of security produced at military heritage sites. A key conclusion is that the way heritagization incorporates the ‘naturalness’ of the gender binary and heterosexuality makes conceptualizing security without territory, or territory without military protection, inaccessible. The gendering of emotions and architectural and spatial arrangements supports historical narratives that privilege masculine protection and reinforce a taken-for-granted nativist community. A feminist analysis of military heritage highlights how gender and sexualities restrict security imaginaries; that is, understandings of what is conceivable as security.

Hot interpretations of difficult heritage: the Memorial Hall of the Nanjing Massacre in China

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yujie Zhu
Keyword(s):  
Emotional Impact ◽  
Multiple Perspectives ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Heritage Sites ◽  
The Past ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
Nanjing Massacre ◽  
National Heritage ◽  
Open Dialogue ◽  
Heritage Interpretation

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the construction of national heritage through the interpretation of sites and events, with a particular focus on hot interpretation at difficult heritage sites. Design/methodology/approachThis paper examines the processes of difficult heritage interpretation at the Memorial Hall of the Nanjing Massacre over the past 30 years, and examines the resulting political implications.FindingsAligning with contemporary national social and political agendas, heritage interpretation at the Memorial Hall actively serves as an authorised educational tool. Despite the hot interpretation techniques used to stimulate the emotional impact of visitor experiences, this particular traumatic past has been utilised in nation building practices that legitimise specific histories and form a national image on an international stage.Research limitations/implicationsHeritage interpretation of difficult history will benefit from open dialogue and assessment of the past from multiple perspectives. This requires all stakeholders to work together to develop interpretation strategies that acknowledge and prioritise the needs of post-conflict societies. Without this form of open dialogue and reflection, the official claims of heritage interpretation achieving reconciliation between conflicted peoples remain superficial. Originality/valueThis study offers a novel contribution to the discussion of heritage interpretation. The results shed light on the cultural processes surrounding state interpretation of traumatic pasts for specific political uses. The study suggests ways in which heritage sectors and authorities can achieve social goals, such as public education, reconciliation and peacebuilding, through such processes of heritage interpretation.

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