Transnational Dialogues 2022

Aug 23

Transnational Dialogues is a series of round tables organised throughout 2022, in honour of the 50th anniversary of the UNESCO World Heritage Convention. Article 5 paragraph a. of the convention highlights the value of cultural and natural heritage as part of the life of local communities, which inspired the series of Transnational Dialogues. In a series of roundtables, we will expand on the role of art, food and housing as means incorporate heritage into the daily life, and the life of communities, with a particular focus on decoloniality. According to ICCROM, the term decolonization is more than questioning the ideology of colonialism and the top down methodologies of official knowledge production. Decolonization means to embrace multiple perspectives and narratives from different cultural contexts, and co-develop a less segregated world and a less hegemonic model of what is considered heritage. It also maens that the rights of the marginalized, as well as their historic struggle keep their territories, are recognized, and that they can live how the way they want to live. Through the pillars art, food and housing, we expand on the exchange and socialization of knowledge and innovative initiatives that are capable of modifying the relationships established in the territory, in the context of thinking about the decolonization of heritage.

Transnational Dialogues follows up on previous roundtables held in 2020 and 2021, organised by #2021debate team New Heritage Approaches. They showed the need to broaden concepts of landscape and heritage values so that social practices, uses and collectivity become part of the daily lives of communities. They also showed the importance of strengthening collaboration between peripheral countries, to bring together different social segments (in addition to academia) and further identify convergences and diversities in heritage and landscape conservation processes, promoting training adapted to those different peripheral realities.