Topic
Cultural heritage
About: Cultural heritage is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 28201 publications have been published within this topic receiving 273875 citations. The topic is also known as: cultural assets & cultural goods.
Papers published on a yearly basis
Papers
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TL;DR: Preservation in the Age of Large‐Scale Digitization explores the implications for preservation practice of the digitization of books and, by implication, the authors' cultural heritage in general.
Abstract: The cultural heritage preservation community now functions largely within the environment of digital technologies. This article begins by juxtaposing definitions of the terms “digitization for preservation” and “digital preservation” within a sociotechnical environment for which Google serves as a relevant metaphor. It then reviews two reports published twelve years apart under the auspices of the Council on Library and Information Resources. Preserving Digital Information presented an insightful and visionary framework for digital preservation in 1996. Preservation in the Age of Large-Scale Digitization explores the implications for preservation practice of the digitization of books and, by implication, our cultural heritage in general. These juxtapositions frame four dilemmas for preservation relating to the impact of environmental storage, new challenges to preservation quality, threats to audiovisual heritage, and an emerging expertise gap. The article concludes with recommendations and observations on making difficult choices. It’s the end of the world as we know it. (R.E.M.)
137 citations
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TL;DR: The authors argue that the same is true of heritage; that as a result of its increasingly broad definition, and the exponential growth of listed objects, places and practices of heritage in the contemporary world, we hazard becoming overwhelmed by memory and in the process rendering heritage ineffective and worthless.
Abstract: This paper considers the implications for cultural heritage of observations regarding individual and collective memory which suggest that the process of forgetting is in fact integral to remembering – that one cannot properly form new memories and attach value to them without also selecting some things to forget. Remembering is an active process of cultivating and pruning, and not one of complete archiving and total recall, which would overwhelm and cause us to be unable to make confident decisions about which memories are valuable and which are not. I argue that the same is true of heritage; that as a result of its increasingly broad definition, and the exponential growth of listed objects, places and practices of heritage in the contemporary world, we hazard becoming overwhelmed by memory and in the process rendering heritage ineffective and worthless. I refer to the consequence of this heterogeneous piling up of disparate and conflicting pasts in the present as a ‘crisis’ of accumulation of the past. T...
137 citations
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors discuss the state of the practice from the urban perspective on the integration of cultural heritage as mean for sustainable development (SD) with a mixed-methodology, 19 reports on urban development, management and competitiveness were analyzed.
137 citations
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TL;DR: The African Cultural Heritage and Landscape Database (ALAHALD) as discussed by the authors is a digital library of spatial and non-spatial materials relating to cultural heritage sites in Africa, including the Wonderwerk Cave in South Africa.
137 citations
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03 Dec 2008
TL;DR: The 2003 International Convention on the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICHC) as discussed by the authors was the first international legal instrument for the protection of cultural heritage, which is a unique instrument in the cultural heritage regulation process.
Abstract: The 2003 Convention on the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage
(ICHC), secured a high number of ratifications in a short space of time1 This
reflects the concern of the international community to respond urgently to
threats to this vulnerable heritage The willingness of so many states to
commit themselves to this Convention is noteworthy, particularly in view
of the fact that this represents an important departure in terms of the cultural heritage regulation, and is a unique instrument in the cultural heritage
field This departure is mainly as a result of the character of its subject
matter – one that is primarily without material form and whose expressions
and physical manifestations are, in fact, secondary In this sense, it is the
mirror image of the previous cultural heritage Conventions where the material heritage (movable cultural property, monuments and sites) was the
central subject of protection and any intangible values contingent on these
For example, in the 1972 World Heritage Convention, under the 2002
revision of the Operational Guidelines, the ‘associated intangible values’ of
cultural properties were recognised as an element in the value for which such
properties might be inscribed on the World Heritage List (Luxen 2000;
Deacon and Beazley 2007), while the spiritual significance of movable items
of cultural property is also recognised in the 1970 Convention2 UNESCO’s
1989 Recommendation on Safeguarding Traditional Culture and Folklore opened
the path for the development of this Convention, but was much more limited in its ambitions and did not impose on member states any binding
obligations
One of the most significant aspects of this Convention, and a focus of thischapter, is the central role it gives to the cultural communities (and groups and,
in some cases, individuals) associated with ICH that is unprecedented in this
area of international law This is a response to the very specific character of ICH
that exists only in its enactment by practitioners and, therefore, whose continued practice depends wholly on the ability and willingness of the culturalgroup and/or community concerned This introduces a clear cultural rights
dimension to the safeguarding of ICH that, although present in other areas of
cultural heritage protection, is much more explicitly drawn in relation to intangible cultural heritage and is another noteworthy characteristic of this Convention
With the introduction of intangible cultural heritage into the picture,cultural heritage preservation has become a much more complex and political
question than it was when preservation institutions restricted their interest
to monuments and artefacts Since ICH is embedded in the social and cultural lives of the cultural communities, safeguarding when exercised as a
public policy will interfere directly in processes taking place in the present
and developed by real, human collectives (Arantes 2007) Moreover, inclusion of the idea of ICH within the broader rubric of cultural heritage provides opportunities to democratise the process by which we give value to
heritage, giving a larger role to local people especially in the developing
world Indeed, the question of assigning value or significance to ICH raises a
further one – is it necessary for ICH expressions or practices to be highly
valued outside the immediate cultural community in order to be defined
officially as heritage? (Deacon et al 2004: 11) The implications of these and
other questions run deep and must be addressed
The purpose of this chapter, then, is to explore the implications of thisnew approach in cultural heritage treaty-making and, in particular, what it
means for the implementation of the Convention itself and national cultural
policy-making In order to do this, I attempt to place the 2003 ICHC in the
wider context of the evolution in thinking about ‘culture’ in international
policy-making over the last quarter century – moving from a high art to a
more anthropological conception – and how this has informed both the
development of cultural heritage law and human rights thinking I also
situate the references to the community (group and individual) of the 2003
ICHC within international law, in particular human rights and environmental law in which these notions are much more often applied
However, before taking this discussion further, it is useful to present abrief outline of the main elements of the Convention itself, with a focus on
the references in the text to the role of the cultural community (see also
Aikawa-Faure this volume)
137 citations