As a reservoir of experiences, developed across different cultures, Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) offers inspiring examples of alternative ways of understanding the relationship with the nature and the environment, of healing and taking care of each other, of strengthening social bonds and sustaining livelihoods. In this sense, ICH can be an agent for change and a resource for imagining alternative ways of living on an endangered planet, what is conventionally referred to as “sustainable development”.

The webinar series “Intangible Cultural Heritage and Sustainable Development” brings together the UNESCO Chairs on Intangible Cultural Heritage to tackle the concept of “sustainable development” from the particular perspectives and field of expertise of each Chair (i.e. cultural diversity, education, comparative law, policy and law, applied studies, critical heritage studies etc.). Discussants from a variety of disciplines will join the sessions with the aim of decompartmentalizing the debate following each presentation.

First session: 14/10/ 2022 14.00-16.00 CET

Kristin Kuutma, UNESCO Chair on Applied Studies of Intangible Cultural Heritage
Graduate School for Culture Studies and Arts, Institute of Cultural Research, University of Tartu

Ownership and rights: Sustainable Development ideals with inequalities of recognition and resource command

The UNESCO-defined ICH or living heritage domain and its management is fundamentally retrospective, and yet by its political alignment suggests to pursue the UN futurist Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development Goals. This discussion will particularly engage with the goal to reduce inequalities. My critical inquiry unpacks the entangled socioeconomic implications and resource command in relation to designated heritage practices. For minority groups there emerge remarkable sites of meaning that project the dismissed rights for self-determination. Alongside resource command, these reflections analyse inequalities in the politics of recognition. My ethnographic material is based on long-term fieldwork at ICH-related targeted meetings.

Access by videoconference:
https://cnrs.zoom.us/j/94804224217?pwd=TTZjZTN1Q2ZnclJIN2c1WFo0amJrdz09
ID: 948 0422 4217
Code: g3HqFM