Cultural heritage is the tangible and intangible representation of values, beliefs, traditions and lifestyles of a culture. This includes artistic expressions, objects, places and sites that have a special meaning to people. Objects include architectural works, sculpture, painting, inscriptions and archaeological sites. Cultural heritage also encompasses social and living cultural practices, such as traditional craftsmanship, oral history, performances and everyday activities of a community.
When most people think of cultural heritage, they think of historical monuments, buildings and archaeological sites. However, there is more to it than that. Cultural heritage can be an intangible, such as a belief system or even just a family tradition like having a certain meal on Christmas Eve. It can even be a sense of belonging to a particular place or ethnicity.
Intangible heritage may not be as easily identified or preserved, but it is equally important to a community and society. It is the intangible heritage that connects us to the past and gives our communities a sense of identity and purpose.
As we learn about our heritage, we realize that it has helped to shape who we are as a person. It can inspire us, give us confidence and help us feel that we belong in our families and in our places. It can also help us to understand the values of our cultures and why they may have been created as they were. It is important for us to continue to value our heritage and make sure that it is passed on to the next generation.
It is not always easy to preserve a culture because there are some individuals who don’t appreciate the importance of it or don’t want it in their lives. This can be due to social, economic or religious factors or pressures. It can also be because some of the cultural heritage is based on a past that is uncomfortable or incomprehensible to the individual.
Cultural heritage is important to both the global and local community, but it is particularly significant for minority groups that are at risk of being displaced or dispersed by a dominant society. This threat can take many forms, including nonstate armed groups, militias or invading armies who deliberately attack and destroy cultural heritage in order to erase the association of their victims with locations and buildings as well as the cultural heritage as a whole. Such destructive actions are considered a form of cultural and possibly even social genocide.
Those who are responsible for the protection of cultural heritage need to be aware of these challenges and how to respond to them. One of the most effective strategies has been to establish partnerships between those who are the custodians of a local culture and those who specialize in preservation and organization. This helps to ensure that funds and experts are available to support projects aimed at preserving the culture.
This approach has also been effective for museums, which have responded to the challenge of valuing cultural heritage by recognizing that it is more than just a collection of objects. This has allowed them to shift their roles from repositories of antiquities to the stewards of cultural treasures.