UNESCO

Chair on Heritage Futures

Climate Heritage Breakthrough

2024-09-28

Congrats to the Climate Heritage Network has achieved a major breakthrough by securing a total of $ 1.5 million in private funding for a series of initiatives.

Most notably, the “Imagining Low Carbon, Just, Climate Resilient Futures through Culture and Heritage” Project” will address two complementary problems. While contemporary climate planning suffers from a pervasive failure to help people imagine plausible ways of living that are not wedded to the carbon economy and the systems that support it, cultural heritage practice is not sufficiently attentive to address the climate change crisis at a large enough scale. By increasing culture-based climate action, transforming climate policy via cultural heritage, and supporting a range of partner communities, funding from the Mellon Foundation will address both issues at once.

The new funding for this and a number of additional smaller projects, means that the Climate Heritage Network is not only able to scale-up its activities but also continues to extend its agenda towards finding new roles for cultural heritage in the context of the climate change crisis. It is a good example why cultural futures can make us hopeful!

The UNESCO Chair on Heritage Futures is a sustaining member of the Climate Heritage Network.

Heritage Futures for World Heritage Cities

2024-09-25

In the context of the 17th World Congress of the Organisation of World Heritage Cities (OWHC) in Cordoba, Spain, 24-27 September 2024, Cornelius Holtorf ran a Heritage Futures Workshop for 21 elected politicians and world heritage managers from the Belgium, Hungary, Germany, Korea, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland, Sweden, and the US.

Two days before the workshop, UN member states had assembled in New York for the UN Summit of the Future where they passed a joint Pact for the Future. The Pact does not only acknowledge culture as an “integral component of sustainable development” but also calls for more “evidence-based planning and foresight” to improve the wellbeing of current and future generations. That makes developing modes of long-term governance and futures literacy even more urgent for the cultural heritage sector and World Heritage.

In our participative workshop (one group pictured at work above), we were together exploring in detail how cultural heritage relates to specific futures and how futures thinking can enhance the management of World Heritage Cities today. Participants enhanced their capability of imagining alternative futures and reflected on how their World Heritage Cities can contribute to finding innovative solutions for a better tomorrow.

During the Congress we also enjoyed a festive occasion in the Mezquita-Catedral de Córdoba including speeches by local, regional, and national politicians and a performance of Beethoven’s Symphony #9.

Wicked Problems for Archaeologists

2024-09-01

John Schofield’s new book Wicked Problems for Archaeologists. Heritage as Transformative Practice (OUP, 2024, 300pp.) was prompted by Shadreck Chirikure’s 2021 question: “Why is it that archaeology—a discipline that deals with human experience over the long term—is failing to achieve its potential in tackling global challenges?” (259). Schofield’s discussion and answer to this question reflects a view that is rather innovative, and it constitutes a watershed for archaeology.

Although, over the years, there have been quite a few book-length accounts of archaeology’s aims in society and how to reach them, Schofield takes leadership now and offers a new mission and direction for the entire team of Archaeologists. The take on archaeology advocated by Schofield, whose battle cry is “Archaeologists assemble!” (298), is not Marxist but it nevertheless is critical, in the sense that the discipline is meant to address some of the world’s most wicked problems such as climate change, environmental pollution, health and well-being, social justice, and conflict: archaeologists and heritage practitioners can help make the world a fairer, safer, and healthier place for everybody (299).

The volume presents a critical overview of where archaeology is positioned right now in relation to these wicked problems and how archaeologists could enhance their own contribution to solving them in the future. Schofield’s agenda is intellectual but in equal measure it is also about policy, leadership, social-planetary boundaries, and sustainable development goals (SDGs)… In his perspective, key terms that should guide archaeologists include transdisciplinary collaboration, the imagination, small wins, and policy entrepreneurship.

This is an agenda I like a lot, and it is close to my own approach to archaeology using labels such as ‘applied archaeology’ and ‘heritage futures’. As Schofield asks his student readers (302): how can archaeologists do more to persuade doubters that archaeology is central to helping understand and resolve many of the world’s greatest challenges? Is archaeology not about the past, but about the present and the future?

Speculative historical marker in New York

2024-08-15

In relation to the forthcoming UN Summit of the Future, Tactical Public AR(t) created a specularive historical marker for New York.

Tactical Public AR(t) is a collaboration between an education, technology and social innovation specialist and a public art specialist. It uses Augmented Reality* to educate,  empower, and amplify. 

They invite young people from around the world to have their voice heard through an innovative way by creating speculative future historical messages related to the themes of the Summit of the Future. Many of these will be placed on augmented reality historical markers which will be located around the UN and New York City during the Summit of the Future.  They ask:

  • Which potential actions are most important to you, imagining that they will be commemorated?
  • What is your desired future?
  • What might it take to get there?

But isn’t it ironic that those advocating for “multi-generational decision-making” choose to make their point by using some of the most backward looking and generally least-appreciated forms of heritage… ?

Intangible Cultural Heritage and Climate Change

2024-06-19

I have been invited by UNESCO to contribute to a meeting of nearly 40 international experts and UNESCO staff on Safeguarding intangible cultural and climate change, held on 19-20 June 2024 at UNESCO in Paris.

Among the attendents I was presenting for were Fumiko Ohinata, Secretary of the UNESCO 2003 Convention, Susanne Schnüttgen, Chief of Unit for Capacity Building and Heritage Policy, Culture Sector, UNESCO, and two more UNESCO Chairs: Heba Aziz, UNESCO Chairholder for World Heritage and Sustainable Tourism Management in the Arab region at the German University of Technology in Oman—GUtech, and Susan Keitumetse, UNESCO Chairholder for African Heritage Studies and Sustainable Development, University of Botswana.

See UNESCO’s news report here.

Venice Charter Reframed

2024-05-28

Cornelius Holtorf presented a talk entitled “The Climate Heritage Paradox — considering regeneration” for ca. 30 international heritage experts at the conference Venice Charter [Re-] framed 1964-2024: New Heritage Challenges held at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Lisbon, in co-operation with ICOMOS Portugal, in Lisbon, Portugal (28 May 2024).

In my paper I argued for a shift in the approach to cultural heritage management. Moving beyond the Venice Charter’s focus on conservation as preservation of historical evidence, I advocate for a perspective of regeneration. This involves viewing cultural heritage not as static artifacts but as dynamic, ever-changing entities akin to ecosystems. By embracing change and transformation, cultural heritage can contribute to human and non-human well-being, resilience, and sustainability in the face of contemporary challenges like the climate crisis. (summary provided by Chat GPT)

In relation to the main theme of the conference addressing 60 years since the Venice Charter, it seems to me that what has changed since 1964 may be summarised like that:

The Venice Charter focuses a great deal on establishing fairly restrictive policy in the name of preserving ancient fabric as a living and authentic witness of the past. But today many experts are more interested in what cultural heritage does (or can do) for people and society, not the least in the light of challenges like those caused by climate change.

Do we need a revised policy maximizing the benefits of heritage for people?

Embracing Change

2024-04-18

I presented a keynote lecture entitled “Embracing Change: Cultural Heritage and Regeneration” for the 2024 International Forum on Cultural Heritage: Sustainability and Resilience hosted by the Asian Network of Industrial Heritage in Taiwan.

The event was part of the 2024 International Day of Monuments and Sites on 18 April, this year dedicated to the theme “Disasters and Conflicts through the Lens of the Venice Charter”. The forum aimed to explore sustainable practices and the resilience and adaptability of cultural heritage in the face of contemporary challenges.

The audience comprised 55 participants on site and additional 70 participating online via Facebook on Youtube.

My talk in the session on Sustainability and Futures focused on the following issues:

“Disasters and conflicts are the outcome of societal failures to take sufficient precautions, respond adequately to emerging events, or behave appropriately peacefully towards each other. Their impact is perceived as worse if acceptance of change is low. I argue that all this can be improved by an updated perception of (world) cultural heritage that is based on concepts of renewal and regeneration rather than conservation and restoration, as it is, for example, still advocated in the 1964 Venice Charter. Narratives of change over time, exemplified by ever-changing cultural heritage, are likely able to improve resilience and preparedness for transformations in future societies. They can also facilitate a new more pan-human or indeed post-human understanding of our shared world. As Tim Ingold (2024) wrote recently, cultural heritage should not be seen as an inheritance to be transmitted from one generation to the next but as a living and perduring process of continuous renewal generating social life under varying circumstances over time.“

UCLA Talk

2024-02-22

My Wednesday Pizza Talk at the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology attracted an audience of cirka 40 undergraduate and graduate students, researchers and Faculty.

I discussed the connections between Archaeology, Heritage and the Future, using examples ranging from prehistoric futures to UNESCO World Heritage properties to contemporary long-term repositories for nuclear waste. I also discussed the concept of ‘heritage futures’ and how it matters in relation to sustainable development and to addressing challenges posed by climate change and violent human conflicts.

I concluded summarising what the Archaeology of the Future is all about and what it takes to become a Future Archaeologist oneself – with inspiration from Disneyland.

Review by Kate Croll

2024-02-05

Our book

Holtorf, C. and Högberg, A. (eds). 2021. Cultural Heritage and the Future. New York: Routledge. 279 pp. ISBN 978-1-138-82901-5 (paperback).

has been reviewed by Kate Croll, Dept of Anthropology, Archaeology and Development Studies, University of Pretoria, South Africa. Her review has now been published in South African Archaeological Bulletin 78 (219), 2023, 123-125.

Among others, she writes:

“Ultimately, this book is a useful reference for all heritage
practitioners – from archaeologists to heritage site managers –
since it provides a guide for how to think about the future in a
broad sense: that it is changeable and fluid, and that the way
we think about heritage today should be equally flexible.”

Getty Scholarship

2024-01-31

January through March, Cornelius Holtorf spends in Los Angeles, USA as a Getty Conservation Guest Scholar.

During this time he is concerned with a project entitled “Heritage in Transformation”. His main question is this: if the future will be (and must be) changing in relation, among others, to the climate crisis, what does that mean for how the past and cultural heritage will be changing and have to change?