Back to search

SIS-MILJO-Strategiske instituttsatsninge

Cultural heritage: Negotiations, policy and practice

Awarded: NOK 12.1 mill.

During 2014-2015 9 researchers have been involved in the strategic research project. Much of the activity in 2014 has been related to the completion of the Ashgate-anthology which is under release. The publishing date is set to January 2016. Editors are Torgrim S. Guttormsen and Gretel Swensen. The book's title is ' Heritage, Democracy and the Public. Nordic approaches to managing heritage in the service of society '. The anthology was described in last year's progress report. 2015 is the closing year of the SIS and has been devoted to popular science dissemination. The purpose is to ensure that the results are reaching a wider circle of cultural heritage managers, via popular articles, presentations and thematic seminars. It has so far this year been written four short articles that have been published on NIKUs website and with links to other publishing within the SIS. Here are a few samples from abstracts on the web: First example: Satellite towns as cultural heritage. Which values are prevailing in the selection of objects from the grade II listed the previous century? Public institutions such as schools, town halls, churches and hospitals have been given protected status. At the same time the Norwegian welfare State's most comprehensive architectural manifestations from the post-war period, the satellite towns, are conspicuously absent from the list of protected structures. Are they simply too big and massive to be considered cultural heritage? Second example: Is specialist expertise a threat to democracy in heritage protection cases? It has been claimed from the internationally leading theorists, that the professionals are a unified group that dominates such processes, which leads to situations where the other voices in the debate don't come forward. A survey of the progress of action around the protection of Levanger City Centre shows that the situation is not that simple. Third example: Global versus local cultural heritage. What is the relationship between sites granted World Heritage status and local practices? The relationship between international conventions, national strategies and local practices has been a central theme within the cultural heritage research. It is a more important topic than ever since the number of sites with this status in Norway has increased. Fourth example: Art in the school buildings: an expression of democracy and an unknown resource. The last 40 years culture politicians have placed great emphasis on, and granted extensive resources to the dissemination of the arts to children and young people. Oslo's nearly 200 school buildings have been adorned with art by renowned Norwegian artist. But is there really anybody who notices all this art? And what happens when time passes and maintenance and preservation of such works of art are due? Several popular articles have been submitted this year and will soon be published. A central contribution to the dissemination of results from the project will be done by Joar Skrede. He is in full swing with writing a method book that has students who are at the start of the studies as the target group. The publisher is a Universitetsforlaget. The working title is 'Language, power and ideology. An introduction to critical discourse analysis'. The book starts with an account of the rise of critical discourse analysis (critical discourse analysis, CDA) as a research field, where the main actors and the different directions are presented. Since the critical discourse analysis, as the name implies, are critical of certain societal conditions, be it discrimination, racism, social inequality, neoliberalism, instrumentalisation of organizations, people, etc., there is a need to discuss if and how one can justify the critical studies. The goal is to get the reader to reflect around such issues and substantiate the possibility of performing critical studies. Visual communication is becoming increasingly important in the dissemination of different message, be it in online newspapers, magazines, advertising, television, etc. It is therefore important to discuss how discourses are created and reproduced through text, images, audio, body language, etc. Here key concepts and ways to analyze the visual material will be presented. On the basis of the description of the rise of critical discourse analysis as a method, a separate chapter will be dedicated to how it can be used in practice. An analysis of the red green action plan the Government's 'Culture and industry' from the 2007 will be used as an example. Through a step-by-step analysis of the text and images, this chapter will demonstrate how the action plan (re) produces certain discourses that may influence Norwegian cultural life. The book is filled with many practical examples and discusses common issues and challenges that arise along the way in the use of the method.

Cultural heritage represents a manifest and important field of interaction between past and present. Successful policies and practises of heritage management require genuine knowledge and understanding of how and why these values have been constituted, an d of how and why they are continuously negotiated and redefined along with other changes in contemporary society. This on-going process is shaped by impacts from a variety of value systems, economic, social and cultural and from domestic political directi ves as well as from international conventions, treaties and directives. The first set of problems to be analysed in the project, are the relationship between recognised value assessments and local practise, with prime objectives to study what happens whe n cultural historic assets are being reinterpreted and turned into cultural heritage and what happens when recognised national value assessments are being turned into local policy. The second set of problems relate to processes of exclusion and inclusion of cultural heritage related to a selection of minorities and subgroups. Prime objectives are to explore some of the processes of exclusion and inclusion of cultural heritage which take place related to certain minorities and subgroups and to investigate if and how cultural heritage is used as an instrument with contested meanings. The third set of problems centre around the relationship between international conventions, national and regional strategies and local practice, with prime objective to analys e what consequences the implementation of regulatory framework and conventions can have for the local, regional and national cultural heritage management, and with the role UNESCO`s World heritage convention has had for place development, branding and ide ntification in focus. The project will be organised in 3 WPs, where all participating researchers are expected to submit at least two-three scientific articles and to present at least one international paper.

Publications from Cristin

No publications found

Funding scheme:

SIS-MILJO-Strategiske instituttsatsninge

Thematic Areas and Topics

Globale utfordringerInnovasjon i offentlig sektor (utgår 2014)Innovasjoner i virksomheter innenfor offentlig forvaltning og tjenesteytingInternasjonaliseringLTP3 Kultur, sivilsamfunn og medienes rolleDelportefølje InternasjonaliseringGrunnforskningPolitikk- og forvaltningsområderMiljø, klima og naturforvaltningDelportefølje Et velfungerende forskningssystemGlobale utfordringerGlobale miljøutfordringerPortefølje Banebrytende forskningUtviklingsarbeidNaturmangfold og miljøInternasjonaliseringInternasjonalt prosjektsamarbeidPolitikk- og forvaltningsområderOffentlig administrasjon og forvaltningPolitikk- og forvaltningsområderKommunal-, distrikt- og regionalforvaltningPortefølje ForskningssystemetNaturmangfold og miljøGlobale miljøutfordringerDelportefølje Forskning og innovasjon (forskning på)LTP3 Innovasjon i stat og kommuneAnvendt forskningInnovasjon i offentlig sektor (utgår 2014)LTP3 Fagmiljøer og talenterDelportefølje KvalitetInnovasjon i offentlig sektor (utgår 2014)Forskning og innovasjonLTP3 Grunnbevilgninger og institusjonell støtteKulturKulturVitenskap og samfunnLTP3 Styrket konkurransekraft og innovasjonsevneLTP3 Høy kvalitet og tilgjengelighetPolitikk- og forvaltningsområderLTP3 Utenforskap, inkludering, kulturmøter og migrasjonLTP3 Tillit og fellesskapPolitikk- og forvaltningsområderKultur, kirke, idrett og medierPortefølje Velferd og utdanningKulturSamfunnets kulturelle grunnlagFornyelse og innovasjon i offentlig sektorForskning og innovasjon