Indigenous definition of 'heritage'. Expert Interview: Manuel May Castillo

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En provenance du cours de Universiteit Leiden

Heritage under Threat

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Universiteit Leiden

Heritage under Threat

59 notes

In this course you will learn to articulate your own concepts about (threatened) heritage and that of others. What is your heritage? Who defines heritage? Why is heritage under threat? How can we protect heritage? WW1, WW2, Cold war politics and contemporary conflicts as well as continuing political and socio-economic inequalities and colonial pasts are all factors playing a role in the global heritage discussions and approaches to (or lack of ) valorization and protection of heritage. Hence, issues behind destruction or threats to heritage are related to complex issues, often connected to complex landscapes of wars, the war-on-terror, fundamentalism, migration, global warming, financial crises, inequality and diverse interests of local communities. This course, sponsored by the LDE Centre for Global Heritage and Development and the Honours Academy of Leiden University, and the Netherlands Commission for UNESCO gave its support to one of the sections of the MOOC, will explore these issues. We wish to engage global communities and widen the perspective on threatened heritage. You can help us with this.

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Heritage and inequality

Hi everybody welcome to the second module! Last week we talked about the concept of heritage and how heritage can be very personal. This week we will dive into how heritage is actually defined, both within the field of (archaeological) heritage management, as well as for local communities. We will also discuss various forms of inequality which unfortunately can come with defining and framing something as heritage. Please watch the video's we have prepared for you first and then proceed with the quizz and case study!

Who defines heritage8:34

Conceptualising heritage. Expert interview with Dick Douwes4:17

Who defines heritage? Expert interview with Koosje Spitz from UNESCO4:47

The changing values of heritage. Expert interview with Koosje Spitz14:45

Indigenous definition of 'heritage'. Expert Interview: Manuel May Castillo7:09

What is shared about World Heritage? Expert Interview: Koosje Spitz2:22

The relation between nation-state and heritage. Expert Interview: Dick Douwes5:52

Rencontrer les enseignants

Dr. Sada Mire, Assistant Professor

Faculty of Archeology, LDE Centre for Global Heritage and Development

Well, talking about heritage and ownership,

we have to keep in mind that both concepts were being imported to

the Maya world and inserted into the Maya ontoology, right?

So in terms of heritage, we can define,

in our language, something that is

the legacy from our ancestors.

And it's really broad, and it involves spiritual values as well,

and spiritual values attached to, for

instance, the land, the landscape, mountains.

Not only archeological places, not only temples,

but also the natural environment, yeah?

So this is how we can understand heritage,

it's all this, all the world.

And in relation to ownership, the thing is that,

still today, we have conflicts generated by this concept,

because when you talk about, for instance,

a sacred place or this sacred land,

it means that it has subjective or

spiritual values that are not possible to be owned by anyone, yeah?

But what we know is that ownership is a concept developed in medieval times.

It generated division of land in Europe,

specifically during the enclosure movement in England.

So it generated division of land, and

also division of communities, and

also deracination of people from the land.

But we have to see that the land, in itself, is our heritage.

So we are also being deracinated, or detached from our heritage, right?

And this process is being reproduced nowadays in Maya lands.

During the 80s, there were some neoliberal policies by

the Mexican government, promoting to divide communal lands.

So the idea was that you can own a plot of land,

and then you have a title, yeah?

But this is very recent for the Maya people.

This is a very new notion of the land, or

how to see the land more in economic terms or

more in objective terms.

And still, there are several discussions in the community because

there are people that do not like and do not want the line to be

divided, because there is a conflict, an ontological conflict.

How can you own a sacred place, yeah?

But we, yeah, we have to acknowledge that the national policies,

and actually, the government have more influence in this process.

And actually, they develop policymaking,

they develop the policies to divide the land.

And most of the time, the committee is not being consulted,

so you have a different, [COUGH] not different, unequal relationship,

where you have a institution imposing a notion of ownership to a community.

And nowadays, well, most of the land has been divided

in small plots, but still, there are some resistance.

And sometimes a line is a division of people, not only a division of lands.

And you have conflicts there in the line, or in both sides of the line.

So in my experience, sometimes both communities just

decide to talk to each other and say, hey, well, this is a division.

This is a new line dividing our communities.

Why we just don't consider this,

instead of a line of division, a place of encounter, yeah?

And then, for instance, both communities celebrate ceremonies in this place,

just trying to join together again.

So this is one of the examples.

And other examples are just violent conflict,

because a line is just a division of people's interest, and so on and so forth.

So most of the time, conflicts are being generated.

And the problem is that this is not a new process,

because it started when the Spaniards arrived.

They also created divisions on a larger scale.

And again, well, in that time as well,

conflicts were generated by these lines, yeah?

So it is not a recent phenomenon, it has a long history as well.

I had a very nice experience last year,

because at the same place in on the hill,

which is a sacred place, there is a line dividing two communities.

So it’s dividing, in two parts, the sacred hill.

So both communities wanted to make ceremonies in that area,

but then you see the line.

And then in the past, the past decades,

there was some conflicts because people just said, hey,

I want to make the ceremony on this side because this is more sacred, or

this is where my grandfather, my grandparents did the ceremonies, yeah?

And I don't care if there's a line here, yeah?

So last year, I remember there was a ceremony

where both communities prepared everything.

And they performed the ceremony together, and

they were just saying, hey, just forget about the line.

Let's just encounter here and just make, again, a community,

or just make Goes through the community again.

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