Squaring the Circle? In Search of the Characteristics of the Relationship between Intangible Cultural Heritage, Museums, Europe and the EU (original) (raw)
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This chapter gives an interdisciplinary analysis of institutional, political, and legal framework adopted in the field of implementation of the concept of intangible cultural heritage (as defined by unesco) in Europe as a region, on the level of the member states of the European Union, as well as on the level of the EU institutions. It is argued that the EU policy towards intangible cultural heritage is a ‘work in progress’, highly influenced by the still present Authorized Heritage Discourse as defined by Laurajane Smith (2016) and the ‘World Heritage’ paradigm. The great potential of bringing intangible cultural heritage on the EU level for, e.g., enhancing community participation in cultural heritage safeguarding or developing creative and inclusive sustainable cultural heritage policies has not been addressed adequately yet. On the other hand, Europe as a region proved to be highly successful in operationalizing the 2003 unesco Convention, e.g. as regards the presence on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. This chapter seeks to find the reasons for this state of the art, as well as to identify challenges and inherent risks stemming from the possible greater visibility of intangible cultural heritage in Europe and in the EU as an organization.
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Creating and Governing Cultural Heritage in the European Union: The European Heritage Label provides an interdisciplinary examination of the ways in which European cultural heritage is created, communicated, and governed via the European Heritage Label scheme. Drawing on ethnographic fi eld research conducted across ten countries at sites that have been awarded with the European Heritage Label, the authors of the book approach heritage as an entangled social, spatial, temporal, discursive, narrative, performative, and embodied process. Recognising that heritage is inherently political and used by diverse actors as a tool for re-imagining communities, identities, and borders, and for generating notions of inclusion and exclusion in Europe, the book also considers the idea of Europe itself as a narrative. Chapters tackle issues such as multilevel governance of heritage; geopolitics of border-crossings and border-making; participation and nonparticipation; and embodiment and aff ective experience of heritage. Creating and Governing Cultural Heritage in the European Union advances heritage studies with an interdisciplinary approach that utilises and combines theories and conceptualizations from critical geopolitics, political studies, EU and European studies, cultural policy research, and cultural studies. As such, the volume will be of interest to scholars and students engaged in the study of heritage, politics, belonging, the EU, ideas, and narratives of Europe.
The EU has recently launched several initiatives that aim to foster the idea of a common European cultural heritage. The notion of a European cultural heritage in EU policy discourse is extremely abstract, referring to various ideas and values detached from physical locations or places. Nevertheless the EU initiatives put the abstract policy discourse into practice and concretize its notions about a European cultural heritage. A common strategy in this practice is 'placing heritage'—affixing the idea of a European cultural heritage to certain places in order to turn them into specific European heritage sites. The materialization of a European cultural heritage and the production of physical European heritage sites are crucial elements in the policy through which the EU seeks to govern both the actors and the meanings of heritage. On the basis of a qualitative content analysis of diverse policy documents and informational and promotional material, this article presents five strategies of 'placing heritage' used in the EU initiatives. In addition, the article presents a theoretical model of circulation of the tangible and intangible dimensions of heritage in the EU heritage policy discourse and discusses the EU's political intents included in the practices of 'placing heritage'.
International Conference: National Museums in a Changing Europe
In recent decades, as Europe's populations have become increasingly diverse and mobile, as nations have struggled in difficult economic circumstances and wrestled with increasing integration, and as new nations have sought independence and greater power, and as larger nations have once again revealed their political muscle, so we have seen national histories deployed politically. A sense of Europe as a space of shared histories and cultural similarities is repeatedly challenged by a past that can be re-awakened by rising nationalism, national insecurity, and by religious and ethnic difference. Across Europe, some national museums construct historical narratives that speak of shared global culture while others promote essentialised nationalism, some memorialise a poetic heroic past while others struggle to forget a more troubled one, many celebrate the heights of cultural achievement while others have found educational and tourism potential in the depths of human depravity. National museums implicitly, and sometimes overtly, still engage in acts of competitive cultural representation, attempting to elevate one nation above another. They are also used to perpetuate a war against former enemies and Others. Europe's national museums house some the continent's greatest historical treasures but also some of its most difficult historical spaces.
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National museums are institutionalized spaces where the past is being used through collections and objects in order to display, narrate, and negotiate ideas of values, of belonging, and most of all of identity. Today a big discussion is being held about their capacity to create and reinforce concepts such as social cohesion, unity, mutual understanding and tolerance among the nations and cultures of Europe. Reformulating in a sense this scholarly question, this paper focus on the crucial role that European National Museums may play in the struggle for European integration, in European completion. In terms of cultural policy, EU policy makers and officials have developed the notion of European integration – the creation of a closer Union among people of Europe – by promoting the communality of Europe's past, by establishing a common European history and cultural heritage, on which a European identity will be based on. However, this challenge seems to be facing serious obstacles. ...
Routledge, 2020
Creating and Governing Cultural Heritage in the European Union: The European Heritage Label provides an interdisciplinary examination of the ways in which European cultural heritage is created, communicated, and governed via the European Heritage Label scheme. Drawing on ethnographic field research conducted across ten countries at sites that have been awarded with the European Heritage Label, the authors of the book approach heritage as an entangled social, spatial, temporal, discur-sive, narrative, performative, and embodied process. Recognising that heritage is inherently political and used by diverse actors as a tool for re-imagining communities, identities, and borders, and for generating notions of inclusion and exclusion in Europe, the book also considers the idea of Europe itself as a narrative. Chapters tackle issues such as multilevel governance of heritage; geopolitics of border-crossings and border-making; participation and non-participation; and embodiment and affective experience of heritage. Creating and Governing Cultural Heritage in the European Union advances heritage studies with an interdisciplinary approach that utilises and combines theories and conceptualizations from critical geopolitics, political studies, EU and European studies, cultural policy research, and cultural studies. As such, the volume will be of interest to scholars and students engaged in the study of heritage , politics, belonging, the EU, ideas, and narratives of Europe.
European Cultural Policy: Priorities and Practices in the Field of Cultural Heritage
Facta Universitatis, Series: Philosophy, Sociology, Psychology and History, 2020
By applying a comparative method and analysis of documents, this paper studies the altered position and role of culture as a delicate field of intervention in the field of European integration policies. From that standpoint we approach the socio-cultural and anthropological analysis of the basic directions of development in European policy in the fields of culture from the beginning of the process of EU integrations to this day. The aim of the research is to indicate the causes and consequences of increased interest of the European political agenda for the concept of cultural heritage, in particular from the 1970s, with the intention to critically analyze the conceptual interpretations and strategic uses of cultural heritage as part of European cultural policy. For that purpose, the paper provides insight into the basic research findings on the priorities and practices in the field of affirmation of the cultural heritage of Europe, obtained by analyzing and interpreting secondary so...
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The purpose of this paper is to develop an understanding of commonalities and differences in the concept of cultural heritage in Europe. This was achieved through a comprehensive academic and non-academic literature review focused on different definitions and conceptualisations related to cultural heritage internationally and in the European context. This is complemented with a comparative study in three European countries. This paper frames cultural heritage using the foundation set up by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO). It further discusses the European actors involved in defining heritage today. Finally, it focuses on three European countries and verifies that they share an understanding of cultural heritage including classifications, categorisation and heritage values. Findings from the overall study show how the definition of cultural heritage across Europe is reasonably homogeneous, and this is confirmed by the analysis of the thre...