ENGAGE NETWORK - South Asia LAUNCH EVENT [9-10 October 2020]

HERITAGE AT THE MARGINS

Addressing challenges and opportunities of working with heritage communities

Praxis Institute for Participatory Practices, Partners in Change, Centre for Heritage Conservation – CEPT Research and Development Foundation Ahmedabad, School of Planning and Architecture New Delhi, India 

Friday October 9, 2020 (2:00 PM – 6:30 PM IST/ 9.30 AM – 2.00 PM BST)

Saturday October 10, 2020 (11:30 AM – 5:30 PM IST/ 7.00 AM – 1.00 PM BST) 

The workshop is open to public audience. Join us: https://tinyurl.com/y5sjeonn

Day One: Friday Oct 9, 2020 (14.00pm IST/ 9.30am BST – 18.00pm IST/14.30pm BST)

Direct Link

https://zoom.us/j/91679461485?pwd=ZTZwbXgrNmVGb0ovbkoraUNaSkdzUT09

Meeting ID: 916 7946 1485

Passcode: 3ngg2020

Day Two: Saturday Oct 10, 2020 (11:30am IST/7.00am BST – 17.30pm IST/ 13.00pm BST)

Join Zoom Meeting

https://zoom.us/j/92787667053?pwd=aGFWY3ozbksrZFk0NEJjSFBMQkhHdz09

Meeting ID: 927 8766 7053

Passcode: 3ngg20202

The Programme of the Workshop comprises:

The regional workshop programme designed to contribute to the network’s research agenda steered by local intelligence, understanding of challenges and potential opportunities, has three critical objectives – (i) Developing scoping research investigation on the needs for humanitarian heritage as an inclusive programme of cultural exchange (ii) Developing a collaborative research environment that facilitate shared and sustained engagement with local heritage communities, their representatives and CSOs within the regional research hubs and (iii) Enhancing and refining the research programme and framework proposed by the ENGAGE network through contribution of local and regional research partners in the three different regional contexts. The workshop comprises of the inaugural session followed by four panels and concluding session on lessons for future.

Panel I: Conserving Humanitarian Heritage 

The session highlights the role of community in the sustenance of the heritage and from the key-hole of humanitarian heritage. It raises the key question- “whose heritage is it anyway?”  It focuses on sense of ownership, mobilization, direct benefits and scales of development within a community as the process of heritage conservation and preservation. The owners of the heritage are the actual passers and receivers of the heritage both in the past and the future, while others act as catalysts in speeding up the processes of conservation and preservation for the community. The session is critical in sharing the experiences of heritage conservation as a tool to engage communities across borders. The session invites speakers and listeners to suggest ideas which could become a new framework for future conservation processes with a fresh methodological approach. This session stands imperative as a transformative and sustainable model for equitable partnerships on shared ‘humanitarian heritage’ as a strategic framework for building resilience and countering conflict impact. 

Panel II: Subaltern Heritage – Redefinitions and Appropriations 

Heritage is that which is inherited. Any group, or community, can pass down its valued possessions - tangible or intangible - over generations. There will be multiplicity of heritage in the same space, time, or among cohabitants. Within this pluralism of heritage, some continue subliminally, until they become appropriated, packaged and marketed. Others, with the patronage of state, business, or dominant identities, go on to determine heritage. This pluralism is not one of happy co-existence, but one of contested spaces, politics and negotiations. This session explores the heritage on the margins - how they become appropriated and sanitized to conform to a larger Brahminical, patriarchal, heteronormative values; and how the relationship of heritage and subaltern communities is defined and determined within larger political narratives. 

Panel III: Cultural Institutions at the Time of Crisis 

Cultural Institutions, traditional and modern, play a very important role in bringing the communities together, especially in the time of crisis. During the time of earthquake, places of worship, congregation and education become a collective shelter; in famine these networks get activated and these places become nodes for managing information and material flow. For an individual, certain instituted cultural practices act as measures of social security. Cultural practices and intuitions also get challenged by introduction of alternative modern, dissenting or progressive organizations that create their own responses during the times of crisis. Weather contested or not these cultural institutes co-exist in cities and contribute significantly to resilience of certain practices. While they are physically held by places of value, they become responsible for defining and redefining meanings of places. This session aims at bringing together understanding of such cultural institutions and their role during a crisis and their contribution to urban resilience. 

You can download the full programme for full event's information, panels, speakers and Concept note, by clicking on the above Event Package.