This paper is a survey of standards being used in the domain of digital cultural heritage with focus on the Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard created by the Library of Congress in the United States of America. The process of digitization of cultural heritage requires silo breaking in a number of areas—one area is that of academic disciplines to enable the performance of rich interdisciplinary work. This lays the foundation for the emancipation of the second form of silo (...) which are the silos of knowledge, both traditional and born digital, held in individual institutions, such as galleries, libraries, archives and museums. Disciplinary silo breaking is the key to unlocking these institutional knowledge silos. Interdisciplinary teams, such as developers and librarians, work together to make the data accessible as open data on the “semantic web”. Description logic is the area of mathematics which underpins many ontology building applications today. Creating these ontologies requires a human–machine symbiosis. Currently in the cultural heritage domain, the institutions’ role is that of provider of this open data to the national aggregator which in turn can make the data available to the trans-European aggregator known as Europeana. Current ingests to the aggregators are in the form of machine readable cataloguing metadata which is limited in the richness it provides to disparate object descriptions. METS can provide this richness. (shrink)

Devises a theoretical framework to think through the politics of transmission within feminism. It draws upon and develops the work of Bernard Stiegler to create a theoretical apparatus that can analyze the politics of transmission within digital culture.

This paper explores the disruptive impact of digitization on cultural heritage preservation, focusing on the challenges posed by intellectual property rights, access, and enforcement. It emphasizes the need to balance innovation and preservation in the digital landscape, addressing issues such as copyright complexities, the commodification of cultural knowledge, and the Western-centric bias in policy shaping. By fostering global cooperation, cultural sensitivity, and public awareness, we will aim at achieving an inclusive and sustainable approach to safeguarding our diverse cultural (...) class='Hi'>heritage in the digital era. (shrink)

Digital images of cultural heritage (CH) contain rich semantic information. However, today’s semantic representations of CH images fail to fully reveal the content entities and context within these vital surrogates. This paper draws on the fields of image research and digital humanities to propose a systematic methodology and a technical route for semantic enrichment of CH digital images. This new methodology systematically applies a series of procedures including: semantic annotation, entity-based enrichment, establishing internal relations, event-centric enrichment, defining hierarchy relations (...) between properties text annotation, and finally, named entity recognition in order to ultimately provide fine-grained contextual semantic content disclosure. The feasibility and advantages of the proposed semantic enrichment methods for semantic representation are demonstrated via a visual display platform for digital images of CH built to represent the Wutai Mountain Map, a typical Dunhuang mural. This study proves that semantic enrichment offers a promising new model for exposing content at a fine-grained level, and establishing a rich semantic network centered on the content of digital images of CH. (shrink)

UNESCO World Heritage sites are places of outstanding significance and often key sources of information that influence how people interact with the past today. The process of inscription on the UNESCO list is complicated and intersects with political and commercial controversies. But how well are these controversies known to the public? Wikipedia pages on these sites offer a unique dataset for insights into public understanding of heritage controversies. The unique technicity of Wikipedia, with its bot ecosystem and editing (...) mechanics, shapes how knowledge about cultural heritage is constructed and how controversies are negotiated and communicated. In this article, we investigate the patterns of production, consumption, and spatial and temporal distributions of Wikipedia pages for World Heritage cultural sites. We find that Wikipedia provides a distinctive context for investigating how people experience and relate to the past in the present. The agency of participants is highly constrained, but distinctive, behind-the-scenes expressions of cultural heritage activism are evident. Concerns about state-like actors, violence and destruction, deal-making, etc. in the World Heritage inscription process are present, but rare on Wikipedia’s World Heritage pages. Instead, hyper-local and process issues dominate controversies on Wikipedia. We describe how this kind of research, drawing on Big Data and data science methods, contributes to digital heritage studies and also reveals its limitations. (shrink)

The lantern exhibition at the Lantern Festival is an important traditional festival in Taiwan. Visitors play an important role in the promotion and sustainable development of intangible cultural heritage. In recent years, the involvement of digital technology in traditional lantern design and shows has contributed to the protection, inheritance, and promotion of ICH, there remains less research on using augmented reality with ICH tourism. In this study, AR is used for ICH lantern exhibition to discuss the learning experience in (...) lantern tourism and the relationship between technology acceptance and satisfaction from the perspective of visitors, as well as evaluate what AR has on improving visitors’ awareness and learning experience. Then, primary variables of the technology acceptance model are combined with generic learning outcomes to integrate ICH, education, and technology to expand TAM, building a new model to study the ICH learning experience. A questionnaire and observation are used. Respondents are visitors participating in the AR lantern exhibition in Taiwan, which is designed by the author. There is a total of 200 questionnaires collected in the end. The result shows that knowledge and understanding, attitudes and values, activity, behavior, and progression, and enjoyment, inspiration, and creativity from GLOs have a positive effect on technology acceptance and actual use. Therefore, visitors are satisfied with innovative and interesting technology learning experiences, enhancing learning interest and results. Besides, the interaction of the AR system improves visitors’ learning motivation, which shows the combination of AR technology with ICH tourism helps improve cultural awareness. (shrink)

Considering that culture is the product of creative and human processes, it is believed that intellectual property is a legal tool that allows for its protection given that it helps conserve, safeguard and preserve its tangible and/or intangible assets. In the case of digital heritage, which is made up of digital elements that should be preserved due to their cultural value, some challenges have arisen regarding their legal protection. One of these challenges is the lack of clarity about (...) how the elements that comprise it should be protected, giving rise to doubts about how intellectual property should help solve this conflict. This article presents the discussion regarding the protection of digital heritage in Colombia, how copyright is becoming an instrument that contributes to its legal protection, and the challenges to further develop it in the country. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Chemsex is a phenomenon in which typically gay, bisexual, trans, queer, and/or related communities of men take psychoactive drugs while having sex, often without a condom. The practice can lead to increased rates of HIV transmission, sexual assault, and in extreme cases murder. GBTQ+ men are already a stigmatised group so those who engage in chemsex face multiple stigmas. This study examines the ways that two types of media report on chemsex while negotiating these stigmas. We take a large (...) data set of newspaper articles written for the general British public and a smaller data set of magazines aimed at GBTQ+ men to examine how chemsex is represented in the media. We find that the mainstream press focus on extreme criminal cases involving chemsex, while the media aimed at GBTQ+ men focus on counselling services and discuss chemsex in relation to gay culture. Chemsex is unlikely to go away, and so we address how information about it is conveyed in different media and call for more research in this area. (shrink)

Medical humanities have a unique role to play in combating biopiracy. This argument is offered both as a response to contemporary concerns about the ‘value’ and ‘impact’ of the arts and humanities and as a contribution to ongoing legal, political, and ethical debates regarding the status and protection of medical heritage. Medical humanities can contribute to the documentation and safeguarding of a nation or people’s medical heritage, understood as a form of intangible cultural heritage. In so doing (...) it can fulfill a unique service in protecting indigenous cultural heritage which potentially makes it of enormous economic benefit to national governments. I use the Indian Traditional Knowledge Digital Library as a case study of the value of medical humanities in challenging biopiracy. If my argument holds, then the value of medical humanities to current intellectual property debates can be demonstrated, and its pertinence to legal and economic interests made clear. However, there are some dangers in this strategy, and my paper closes with a discussion of them. (shrink)

Digital cultural archives and databases are promising an era of heritage democratization and an enhancement of the role of arts in everyday cultures. It is hoped that mass digitization initiatives in many corners of the world can facilitate the secure preservation of human cultural heritage, with easy access and diverse ways for creative reuse. Understanding the dialogic processes within these increasingly vast databases necessitates a dynamic conceptualization of data they contain. The paper argues that this can be found (...) in Juri Lotman’s cultural semiotic notion of text and text’s functions in culture. It elaborates on the three key characteristics of text – expression, boundary, and structure – as manifested within the digital semiosphere. At the same time, the textual dialogues within digital archives are increasingly conditioned by metadata, which is hereby conceptualized as metalanguage inducing a modeling effect on archived texts and defining their possible sphere of dynamics. To balance the explanations of creative operations of digital archives, the paper also demonstrates their auto-communicative mechanisms for facilitating cultural continuities and stability. (shrink)

This edited volume is designed to explore different perspectives of culture, identity and social development using the impact of the digital age as a common thread, aiming at interdisciplinary audiences. Cases of communities and individuals using new technology as a tool to preserve and explore their cultural heritage alongside new media as a source for social orientation ranging from language acquisition to health-related issues will be covered. Therefore, aspects such as Art and Cultural Studies, Media and Communication, Behavioral (...) Science, Psychology, Philosophy and innovative approaches used by creative individuals are included. From the Aboriginal tribes of Australia, to the Maoris of New Zealand, to the mystical teachings of Sufi brotherhoods, the significance of the oral and written traditions and their current relation to online activities shall be discussed in the opening article. The book continues with a closer look at obesity awareness support groups and their impact on social media, Facebook usage in language learning context, smartphone addiction and internet dependency, as well as online media reporting of controversial ethical issues. The Digital progress has already left its dominating mark as the world entered the 21st century. Without a doubt, as technology continues its ascent, society will be faced with new and altering values in an effort to catch-up with this extraordinary Digitization, adapt satisfactorily in order to utilize these strong developments in everyday life. (shrink)

This report aims to offer insights into cutting-edge research on digital well-being. Many of these insights come from a 2-day academic-impact event, The Future of Digital Well-Being, hosted by a team of researchers working with the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) in February 2024. Today, achieving and maintaining well-being in the face of online technologies is a multifaceted challenge that we believe requires using theoretical resources of different research disciplines. This report explores diverse perspectives on how digital (...) well-being can be actively cultivated, while also emphasising the importance of considering individual differences, societal contexts, and nuanced cultural factors. We aim to offer a holistic view of the future of digital well-being, one that will inspire the next generation of designers of online tools, as well as policymakers who will regulate these tools. We start by asking what digital well-being is – how we can best define a concept that is used by diverse stakeholders and researchers from many disciplines in various ways. To do this, we explore the classic ethical theories of well-being, showing how they can give us insights into how the term digital well-being is currently deployed. We then move to look at the existing strategies that have been proposed to actively cultivate digital well-being, exploring the business models that threaten digital well-being and the relative advantages of the digital and non-digital solutions that are currently proposed. On the one hand, digital tools – such as Apple’s Screen Time and app blockers such as Opal and Forest – integrate seamlessly with the digital lifestyles of users. They also create precise metrics for digital well-being, which facilitates their solutions to reduce screen time. On the other hand, non-digital solutions, including mindfulness practices, digital detoxes, and digital well-being coaching, offer a new set of tools to reconnect individuals to their natural rhythms and help to actively promote offline activities. We then move to discuss diversity and how various groups of users have strikingly different digital well-being needs. Embracing neurodiversity in digital well-being is crucial as it strongly impacts the users’ experience of online technologies. When designing for diversity, organisations and designers alike need to prioritise customization for people with physical disabilities, mitigate harmful content for users with mental well-being conditions, address gender stereotypes and online harassment, and be designed in ways that recognize the very real risks of online technologies. This report closes by examining cultural differences. We believe that non-Western conceptions of well-being offer rich sources for enhancing digital well-being insofar as these traditions can inform and inspire the designers of future online technologies. We focus on East-Asian and South-Asian traditions, although in further work we recognise it would be useful to investigate conceptions of well-being that are influential in the Gulf region, Africa, and South America. Each of these areas have ethical frameworks that discuss well-being in depth as well as a rich cultural heritage. In conclusion, this report’s insights underscore the imperative of recognizing diversity in digital well-being, both in terms of cultural contexts and disciplinary perspectives. It emphasises the need for culturally responsive design methodologies and the integration of non-Western philosophical perspectives into current digital well-being research. Embracing this diversity, we believe, offers the best chance to create digital environments that prioritise well-being for users and the societies they live in across the world. Ultimately, we believe that it is not only about designing better online products; it’s about shaping a digital landscape that promotes well-being and flourishing for everyone. (shrink)

This paper explores global K-pop's negotiation and reconstruction of Korean aesthetics via the dismantling, adoption, appropriation, and transfiguring of central elements of Korean traditional culture. Recently, K-pop groups have been incorporating traditional music and dance (gugak), traditional attire (hanbok), traditional houses (hanok), and old palaces (gogung) into music videos disseminated globally over digital platforms like YouTube. In their efforts to incorporate more 'Koreanness' into their musical productions and neutralize criticisms of their use of the 'K' prefix as inauthentic and (...) unconnected to Korean aesthetics, groups like BTS and BLACKPINK are redefining 'K-heritage' for music consumers worldwide. Along with other globally consumed Hallyu productions like K-movies, K-dramas, and K-games, K-Pop is in the process of reconstructing Koreans' and the world's view of the meaning of Korean-ness. (shrink)

Trees belong to humanity’s heritage, but they are more than that. Their loss, through catastrophic fires or under business-as-usual, is devastating to many forms of life. Moved by this fact, we begin with an assertion that heritage can have an active role in the design of future places. Written from within the field of architecture, this article focuses on structures that house life. Habitat features of trees and artificial replacement habitats for arboreal wildlife serve as concrete examples. Designs (...) of such habitats need to reflect behaviours, traditions and cultures of birds, bats, and other animals. Our narrative highlights the nonhuman aspect of heritage, seeking to understand how nonhuman stakeholders can act as users and consumers of heritage and not only as its constituents. Our working definition states that more-than-human heritage encompasses tangible and intangible outcomes of historical processes that are of value to human as well as nonhuman stakeholders. From this basis, the article asks how the established notions of heritage can extend to include nonhuman concerns, artefacts, behaviours and cultures. As a possible answer to this question, the hypothesis tested here is that digital information can (1) contribute to the preservation of more-than-human heritage; and (2) illuminate its characteristics for future study and use. This article assesses the potential of three imaging technologies and considers the resulting data within the conceptual framework of more-than-human heritage, illuminating some of its concrete aspects and challenges. (shrink)

It is estimated that about one and a half billion hours of moving images were produced in 1999, twice as many as a decade before. If that rate of growth continues, one hundred billion hours of moving images will be made in the year 2025. In 1895 there were just above forty minutes of moving images to be seen, and most of them are now preserved. Today, for every film made, thousands of them disappear forever without leaving a trace. Meanwhile, (...) public and private institutions are struggling to save the film heritage with largely insufficient resources and ever increasing pressure from the commercial world. Are they wasting their time? Is the much feared and much touted Death of Cinema already occurring before our eyes? Is digital technology the solution to the problem, or just another illusion promoted by the industry? In a provocative essay designed as a collection of aphorisms and letters, Paolo Cherchi Usai brings an impassioned scrutiny to bear on these issues with a critique of film preservation, an indictiment of the crimes perpetuated in its name, and a proposal to give a new analytical framework to a major cultural phenomenon of our time. The Death of Cinema is published in Italian as L'ultimo spettatore . Sulla distruzione del cinema 1999, Editore Il Castoro. (shrink)

Against the background that the top-level semantic framework of Chinese traditional culture is not comprehensive and unified, this study aims to preserve and disseminate cultural heritage information about Chinese traditional culture through the development of a domain ontology which is constructed from ancient books. A combination of top-down and bottom-up approaches was used to construct the ontology for Chinese traditional culture. An investigation of historians’ needs, and LDA topic clustering model were conducted, understanding the specific needs (...) of historians, collecting the topic, concepts and relationships. CIDOC CRM was reused to construct the basic framework of CTCO. Ontology structure and function were adopted to evaluate the effectiveness of CTCO. Evaluation results show that the ontology meets all the quality criteria of OntoMetrics, and the experts agreed on content representation. CTCO contributes to the organization of traditional Chinese culture and the construction of related databases. The study also forms a common path and puts forward proposals for the construction of domain ontology, which has great social relevance. (shrink)

Co-authored by a Computer Scientist and a Digital Humanist, this article examines the challenges faced by cultural heritage institutions in the digital age, which have led to the closure of the vast majority of born-digital archival collections. It focuses particularly on cultural organizations such as libraries, museums and archives, used by historians, literary scholars and other Humanities scholars. Most born-digital records held by cultural organizations are inaccessible due to privacy, copyright, commercial and technical issues. Even when born-digital data are (...) publicly available, users often need to physically travel to repositories such as the British Library or the Bibliothèque Nationale de France to consult web pages. Provided with enough sample data from which to learn and train their models, AI, and more specifically machine learning algorithms, offer the opportunity to improve and ease the access to digital archives by learning to perform complex human tasks. These vary from providing intelligent support for searching the archives to automate tedious and time-consuming tasks. In this article, we focus on sensitivity review as a practical solution to unlock digital archives that would allow archival institutions to make non-sensitive information available. This promise to make archives more accessible does not come free of warnings for potential pitfalls and risks: inherent errors, "black box" approaches that make the algorithm inscrutable, and risks related to bias, fake, or partial information. Our central argument is that AI can deliver its promise to make digital archival collections more accessible, but it also creates new challenges - particularly in terms of ethics. In the conclusion, we insist on the importance of fairness, accountability and transparency in the process of making digital archives more accessible. (shrink)

This article examines the challenges and opportunities that arise with artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) methods and tools when implemented within cultural heritage institutions (CHIs), focusing on three selected Swedish case studies. The article centres on the perspectives of the CHI professionals who deliver that implementation. Its purpose is to elucidate how CHI professionals respond to the opportunities and challenges AI/ML provides. The three Swedish CHIs discussed here represent different organizational frameworks and have different types of collections, (...) while sharing, to some extent, a similar position in terms of the use of AI/ML tools and methodologies. The overarching question of this article is what is the state of knowledge about AI/ML among Swedish CHI professionals, and what are the related issues? To answer this question, we draw on (1) semi-structured interviews with CHI professionals, (2) individual CHI website information, and (3) CHI-internal digitization protocols and digitalization strategies, to provide a nuanced analysis of both professional and organisational processes concerning the implementation of AI/ML methods and tools. Our study indicates that AI/ML implementation is in many ways at the very early stages of implementation in Swedish CHIs. The CHI professionals are affected in their AI/ML engagement by four key issues that emerged in the interviews: their institutional and professional knowledge regarding AI/ML; the specificities of their collections and associated digitization and digitalization issues; issues around personnel; and issues around AI/ML resources. The article suggests that a national CHI strategy for AI/ML might be helpful as would be knowledge-, expertise-, and potentially personnel- and resource-sharing to move beyond the constraints that the CHIs face in implementing AI/ML. (shrink)

With a mass digitisation programme underway and the addition of non-print legal deposit and web archive collections, the National Library of Scotland is now both producing and collecting data at an unprecedented rate, with over 5PB of storage in the Library’s data centres. As well as the opportunities to support large scale analysis of the collections, this also presents new challenges around data management, storage, rights, formats, skills and access. Furthermore, by assuming the role of both creators and collectors, libraries (...) face broader questions about the concepts of ‘collections' and ‘heritage', and the ethical implications of collecting practices. While the ‘collections as data’ movement has encouraged cultural heritage organisations to present collections in machine-readable formats, new services, processes and tools also need to be established to enable these emerging forms of research, and new modes of working need to be established to take into account an increasing need for transparency around the creation and presentation of digital collections. This commentary explores the National Library of Scotland's new digital scholarship service, the implications of this new activity and the obstacles that libraries encounter when navigating a world of Big Data. (shrink)

This article is discussing the possibilities of new media technologies in the context of transmitting ancient spiritual traditions in various cultural and religious backgrounds. The use of internet as a means to preserve the orally transmitted knowledge of the Aboriginals and Maoris, and in doing so transferring their cultural heritage to their younger generations and interest groups. Following is an extended case study of the Naqshbandi Sufi Order and its specific compatibility of a traditional orientation towards spiritual work among (...) people rather than monastic seclusion and its recent application of digital media resources. Therefore, new technology is being discussed as a logical extension, not without attention being drawn to possible limitations, however. (shrink)

Globalization, in its earlier stages, was expected to erode national and ethnic identities. In contrast, ethnicity and ethnic affiliations persisted, growing socially and politically. This paper examines the role of the globalizing new communications technologies on this process, focusing on Diasporas. The study of trans-state networks based on ethnic solidarity, connections and affinities in the framework of social and political science is quite recent. Following a clarification of the distinction between classical and modern Diasporas we analyse a particular case study, (...) that of the Jewish Diaspora. This diaspora was an early adopter of computer-based communications and the Internet for a wide range of purposes. Early events are described including the diffusion of the Internet to Israel, the planning of a Global Jewish Information Network, Israel 2020 macro scenarios for Israel and the Jewish People and the decision on Jewish Peoplehood through communication technologies. A survey of historical systems follows by a description of the Jewish population and the wide variety of Jewish Web based activities today. These include the Institutional landscape; Jewish media — press, radio, video and blogs; the impact on Jewish religious observance; Jewish genealogy; Online dating; Social networks; Jewish education; Online learning; Jewish Studies and Digital Humanities; Jewish memory. Judaica Europeana supports the activities previously described by aggregating and facilitating the access and the re-use of Jewish digital culture. Europeana is the leading global digital library for cultural heritage as well as a lively eco-system for relevant stakeholders. (shrink)

This special theme examines the dynamic relationships between production, availability, and usage of Big Data, laying out a research agenda for digital heritage at the time of the ‘data turn’. Over the past 15 years, a proliferation of heritage data has been generated by ‘ecosystems of distributed practices’ enacted by the co-working of bodies, cultural identities, organisational workflows, software, application programming interfaces, etc. The authors of research articles and commentaries in this collection explore the three macro-dimensions along which (...) we can map transformations of and by heritage in Big Data ecologies: ontologies or heritage as datified resources, interactions and methodologies and epistemologies. (shrink)

Virtual heritage has been explained as virtual reality applied to cultural heritage, but this definition only scratches the surface of the fascinating applications, tools and challenges of this fast-changing interdisciplinary field. This book provides an accessible but concise edited coverage of the main topics, tools and issues in virtual heritage. -/- Leading international scholars have provided chapters to explain current issues in accuracy and precision; challenges in adopting advanced animation techniques; shows how archaeological learning can be developed (...) in Minecraft; they propose mixed reality is conceptual rather than just technical; they explore how useful Linked Open Data can be for art history; explain how accessible photogrammetry can be but also ethical and practical issues for applying at scale; provide insight into how to provide interaction in museums involving the wider public; and describe issues in evaluating virtual heritage projects not often addressed even in scholarly papers. -/- The book will be of particular interest to students and scholars in museum studies, digital archaeology, heritage studies, architectural history and modelling, virtual environments. (shrink)

DNA possesses a double nature: it is both an analog chemical compound and a digital carrier of information. By distinguishing these two aspects, this paper aims to reevaluate the legally and politically influential idea that the human genome forms part of the common heritage of mankind, an idea which is thought to conflict with the practice of patenting DNA. The paper explores the lines of reasoning that lead to the common heritage idea, articulates and motivates what emerges as (...) the most viable version of it, and assesses the extent to which this version conflicts with gene-patenting practices as exemplified by the U.S. regime. It concludes that the genome is best thought of as a repository of information to which humanity has a fiduciary relationship, and that on this view, the perceived conflict with gene-patenting largely dissolves. (shrink)

This article analyzes how the cooperative principles and values of the social economy are the most pertinent to enhance a relational intelligence that overcomes the potential adverse effects for people and territories of the delegation of human relations in an artificial intelligence built on capitalist values. The analysis is based on the case study of the French cooperative digital platform Les Oiseaux de Passage, which supports different European heritage communities in enhancing their cultural heritage through activities linked to (...) the tourism sector. In this case, the technology operates as a de-intermediary, de-automated and de-standardizer, providing greater transparency and equity to the set of relationships that are established and contributing to the development of more horizontal relationships and economic democracy among partners and with visitors. (shrink)

Interfaces have partially replaced editors. They now administer and have industrialized the processes of content circulation. Web platforms mediatize cultural memory and one example of this is that of online audiovisual archives which are a paradigmatic case involving interfaces mediating our image of the past. Therefore, their role as an enunciative framework is clearly worthy of thought and study. We will thus use a semiotic approach based on the starting hypothesis that digital interfaces shape our belief systems through a discursive (...) framing of content to which they give access. By analyzing two case studies, we will argue that the transparency of interfaces appears to recall the notion of “mechanical objectivity” and thus refashion the reliability of the archives. However, a final counter-analysis of a document read in the framework of an on-site consultation invites us to reshape our considerations and enlarge the perspective from semiotic visual analysis to include the social processes linked to the publication of digital heritage. (shrink)

Olfactory heritage is an aspect of cultural heritage concerning the smells that are meaningful to a community due to their connections with significant places, practices, objects or traditions. Knowledge in this field is produced at the intersection of history, heritage science, chemistry, archaeology, anthropology, art history, sensory science, olfactory museology, sensory geography and other domains. Drawing on perspectives from system dynamics, an approach which focuses on how parts of a system and their relationships result in the collective (...) behaviours of the system, we will outline a series of practices relevant to this field and identify the elements, materials and competences involved, as well as the connections and interactions. While research in olfactory heritage is currently growing, much of the knowledge that could advance our understanding of this field is still being developed within disciplinary boundaries, leading to little integration of the knowledge and methods and limited interdisciplinary interpretation of findings. In the first part, we review the methodologies for identifying, researching and preserving olfactory heritage, highlighting methodological opportunities and challenges from diverse perspectives like smellscape research, odour nuisance management or heritage science. In the second part, we review the presentation and communication of olfactory heritage in museums and other heritage spaces, outlining the value of presenting scents to wide audiences for interpretation and engagement purposes. Finally, we discuss challenges associated with historical scent reconstruction, and discuss future directions for the field, such as the potential of mining large digital collections for olfactory data. (shrink)

Galleries, libraries, archives and museums are striving to retain audience attention to issues related to cultural heritage, by implementing various novel opportunities for audience engagement through technological means online. Although born-digital assets for cultural heritage may have inundated the Internet in some areas, most of the time they are stored in “digital warehouses,” and the questions of the digital ecosystem’s sustainability, meaningful public participation and creative reuse of data still remain. Emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, are used (...) to bring born-digital archives to light, aiming to enhance the public’s engagement and participation. At the core of this debate lies both the openness of data and issues of privacy. How open to the public should born-digital archives be? Should everything be open and available online, and what does it take to achieve balance between openness and privacy, especially through AI initiatives? The study is qualitative and builds on the rationale of grounded theory. The role of AI development is critically investigated in relation to opening up born-digital archives online, by considering privacy and ethics issues. Grounded in the context of the author’s PhD research, the paper proposes a human-centred approach to AI development for democratising its development towards fairness and social inclusion, contrary to the stereotypical cliché of blackboxing, allowing space for the plurality of born-digital archives to flourish. (shrink)

The demand for integrating and sharing heterogeneous data online has attracted the interest of cultural institutions in making information access and retrieval more effective via Semantic Web technologies. The present study proposes a digital repository for 3D scans of modernist sculptures in public spaces in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, with a view to ensuring access, use, reuse and preservation of this information. This is a qualitative exploratory experimental study based on the scientific literature and specific empirical material. (...) It presents the analysis results of vocabularies for physical artifact documents and their digital counterparts on the Semantic Web and a discussion on how these align with the nature of the metadata determined here, as well as a metadata modeling prototype implemented on the Tainacan platform and aimed at cataloging digital 3D replicas. We claim that the proposed model for documenting cultural heritage assets on Tainacan is easy to implement, in that it uses accessible technology with a wide internet user base, highly expressive in its descriptions of 3D and multimedia content and based on well-established metadata and ontology standards recommended by regulatory bodies and communities such as the World Wide Web Consortium and International Organization for Standardization. Keywords: networked heritage documents, digital repositories, 3D digitization, semantic annotation. (shrink)

This article analyses a range of discourses articulated around the figure of the film archive between the late nineteenth and the early twenty-first centuries, accounting for the various possibilities that they open up for considering audiovisual heritage as a potential space either for revolutionary change or for political or textual resistance. Focused mainly on archival discourses in Mexico, the article traces their interaction with both national-historical and anti-imperialist narratives, and the implications of digital and online culture for the (...) encounter between the archiving of film and resistance. It accounts for the position of the archive in negotiations between state and private capital and spaces of artistic autonomy, and for the relationships between the archive, modernity, postmodernity and the notion of posterity. (shrink)

Η εύληπτη εκπαιδευτική προσέγγιση ότι «κληρονομιά είναι οτιδήποτε θέλεις “εσύ” να διατηρηθεί για τις επόμενες γενιές» κλονίζεται στην ερώτηση «όλα όσα μας παραδίδονται από τους προγόνους μας αποτελούν μια προς διαφύλαξη κληρονομιά, εφόσον “εσύ” το αποφασίσεις;». Εκφάνσεις «βαρβαρότητας» που διασώζονται σε προγενέστερες εθιμικές πρακτικές θα μπορούσαν άραγε να αποτελέσουν στοιχεία ΑΠΚ προς διαφύλαξη; Η παρούσα εργασία επιχειρεί μια πρώτη ανίχνευση του σύνθετου αυτού θέματος. Περιπτώσεις μελέτης από τον ελληνικό και διεθνή χώρο διερευνώνται με κριτήρια αξιολόγησης τα αναφερόμενα στη Σύμβαση για (...) τη Διαφύλαξη της ΑΠΚ (UNESCO, 2003). Βάσει αυτών δεν γίνονται αποδεκτές εθιμικές πρακτικές ΑΠΚ που αναζωπυρώνουν μνήμες βίαιων συγκρούσεων μεταξύ μελών κοινότητας/κοινοτήτων, αποκλείουν με βίαιο ή/και υποτιμητικό τρόπο μέλη εξαιτίας του φύλου, της ηλικίας, της επαγγελματικής ιδιότητας, ή του σεξουαλικού τους προσανατολισμού, καθώς και εθιμικές πρακτικές που περιλαμβάνουν κακομεταχείριση ή/και βασανισμό ζώων. Η εφαρμογή των παραπάνω στην πράξη παραμένει αχαρτογράφητο πεδίο. Απαραίτητες φάσεις μιας συστηματικής μελέτης αποτελούν α) η αναγνώριση και η ευαισθητοποίηση των τοπικών κοινωνιών και του ευρύτερου κοινωνικού συνόλου για τις αξίες της ΑΠΚ, β) η έρευνα, τεκμηρίωση και αξιολόγηση των επιμέρους στοιχείων της, γ) η υποστήριξη των διαδικασιών μεταβίβασής της στις νεότερες γενιές, μέσω της τυπικής και μη εκπαίδευσης, δ) η ανάδειξη της σημασίας της σε τοπική, περιφερειακή, εθνική ή/και παγκόσμια κλίμακα. Η ΑΠΚ μετεξελίσσεται και μεθερμηνεύεται διαρκώς μέσω σύνθετων κοινωνικών και πολιτισμικών διεργασιών. Απόπειρες εξαναγκασμένης «αναβίωσης» κάποιας «αυθεντικής» ή «γνήσιας» μορφής μιας έκφανσής της συχνά αποτυγχάνουν, ενώ παραμένουν μεθοδολογικά μετέωρες. Ο ρόλος της εκπαιδευτικής διαδικασίας στην ανάπτυξη σχετικών ηθικών αρχών και κριτικής σκέψης είναι κρίσιμης σημασίας. Λέξεις κλειδιά: άυλη πολιτιστική κληρονομιά, κοινότητες, αξίες, ηθικές αρχές, εκπαίδευση For educational purposes, we may claim that heritage is whatever each one of us individually or collectively wishes to preserve and pass on to the next generation. However, should violent or other disturbing forms of expression, preserved in customary practices, be safeguarded, if the whole or part of the ‘community’ decides to do so? The present paper attempts a first approach to this complex issue. Case studies from Greece and worldwide are investigated and appraised on the basis of the Convention for the Safeguarding of the ICH (UNESCO, 2003). According to the Convention criteria, customary practices that refresh memories of violent conflicts between members of the community/communities, or exclude members with an aggressive and pejorative way because of their gender, age, professional status or sexual orientation, as well as practices involving the ill-treatment and/or torture of animals do not deserve safeguarding. The implementation of the above criteria in practice, however, remains an uncharted area. A systematic study, therefore, should: (a) include initiation, recognition and awareness on the part of local communities and societies about the values of the ICH; (b) promote research, documentation and evaluation of heritage components; (c) support the transition to the younger generations through formal and non-formal educational events; (d) highlight its importance on the local, regional, national and international context. ICH is evolving and constantly interpreted through complex social and cultural processes. Any forced attempt to revive an ‘authentic’ or ‘genuine’ version of ICH cultural expression, besides appearing fake, is methodologically challenged. The role of education in developing ethical principles and a critical approach to heritage is undoubtedly crucial. Keywords: Intangible cultural heritage, communities, values, ethical principles, education. (shrink)

In light of social change and rapid technological improvement, "Cultural Heritage and Moral Obligations: A Philosophical Inquiry into Preservation and Innovation" sets out to investigate the ethical aspects of cultural heritage. This investigation explores the value of cultural legacy as a storehouse of human knowledge, identity, and community while recognising its enormous influence on the construction of both personal and societal narratives. It recognises the difficulties presented by the needs of development and the demands of respecting the past (...) as it makes its way through the conflict between innovation and preservation. The research study used smart PLS software and generated descriptive statistic, correlation coefficient, and the smart PLS Algorithm model between the cultural heritage and moral obligations. The research also describes the relation between preservation and innovation. Using meticulous scrutiny, it illuminates the ethical duties that are intrinsic to the conservation of cultural heritage, advocating for sophisticated comprehensions and moral structures that give precedence to inclusion, fairness, and justice. In the end, this investigation advocates for a future in which the diversity and complexity of human culture are honored, conserved, and treasured for all eternity, encouraging contemplation on our relationships with the past and our obligations to future generations. Overall, the research found that the philosophical investigation of "Cultural Heritage and Moral Obligations" provides a basis for tackling current issues and cultivating long-term strategies for cultural heritage innovation and preservation in a variety of domains and settings. Stakeholders may preserve the history of humanity for future generations and support the principles of inclusion, fairness, and justice by incorporating ethical concerns into decision-making processes. (shrink)

Cultural heritage as an intrinsic element of human activity has undergone notable changes in its perception depending on the historical context in which it is generated. That is why, approaching the role it has played over time, is essential to understand its situation and determine the challenges it faces. The objective of this article is, on the one hand, to analyze the historical evolution of the perception of cultural heritage and, on the other, to reflect on the role (...) it plays in contemporary society. (shrink)

Against the background of Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, the question of an effective cultural policy that would support national identity, contribute to the purification of consciousness from propaganda myths and preserve the heritage of Ukrainian culture is becoming more acute. Since cultural policy is related to both aesthetic-artistic and cultural-anthropological dimensions of social life, in order to identify the effective influence of cultural policy on dominant social practices, it is necessary to find out the universal principles of (...) its functioning. The purpose of this article is to identify the relevant philosophical and methodological basis of cultural policy for modern Ukrainian realities. Based on the fundamental ideas of Richard Rorty’s pragmatic philosophy and his analysis of cultural policies, the generally accepted nature of the inferential approach to social reality on the part of individual social groups was ascertained. The variability of cultural policy depending on the type of social organization community/society is demonstrated. In small social groups of the authoritarian type, social epistemological authority is mediated by the individual preferences of the leader of this group, so the tools of cultural policy are weak (patriarchal family, religious or political sect). An authoritarian or totalitarian mass society shows a high propensity for linguistic practices of propaganda, which can be seen as an extreme distorted form of cultural politics. In democratic societies, cultural policy is able to harmonize social life, improving its practices and building a value-symbolic world that constitutes culture in a broad sense. The social institute of education has all the tools, including digital ones, to shape the necessary social practices and educate a critical thinker who is able to generate conceptual knowledge, i.e. see relationships and be aware. Openness in decision-making, interaction of expert groups, public discussions are necessary elements for an effective cultural policy, which should be different from “cultural management”. Creative cultural industries play an important role in modern popular culture societies, and these industries significantly strengthen the economic component of social life. Public projects and initiatives effectively help to preserve Ukrainian culture, influence the level of awareness of Ukrainians and the economic well-being of our country. (shrink)

This paper presents an attempt to analyse the growth of conflict in the context of globalization processes of the XXI century, in particular the clash of cultural and social identities. The development of digital technologies has provoked an increased array of information flows, which bring disorienting sentiments to society. This resulted in the spread of such social phenomena as “echo chamber” and gaslighting. Conflict of identities is a response to the collapse of a unified society. Purpose and objectives of the (...) paper. The objective is to conduct a socio-philosophical analysis of identity as a conflict-causing phenomenon in the globalized digital age, based on the achievements of modern science and philosophy. Methodology of Research. The main research methods are structural-functional, philosophico-cultural and philosophico-anthropological. The principle “from abstract to concrete” and the principle of systemicity were applied to solve specific research tasks. Research results. On the one hand, modern globalization processes allow the interaction of previously distant or even mutually exclusive cultures, patterns of behaviour, or identities. On the other hand, there is a clash of previously separated and relatively closed cultural, civilizational groups, which becomes a catalyst in forming a completely new (or hybrid) identity and advocating existing identification values, where the alternative reality is perceived as a threat of losing the uniqueness or value of the heritage of generations. As a result, there is a conflict of identities at both the individual and social levels. Conclusion.The globalization processes of the XXI century are penetrating more and more actively into all spheres of social life: there is a clash of cultural and social identities, which provokes increasing conflict levels and grouping to preserve uniqueness in response to global trends, the establishment of new social norms and expansion of human rights. The world is in a state of formation, constant change, and the understanding of the described trends features and their mechanisms reveals their contradictory phenomena “echo chamber”, gaslighting etc. “Otherness” has become an integral feature of today and in our opinion, the search for practices of mutual understanding is becoming another cultural challenge. (shrink)

As museums begin to revisit their definition of ‘‘expert’’ in light of theories about the local character of knowledge, questions emerge about how museums can reconsider their documentation of knowledge about objects. How can a museum present different and possibly conflicting perspectives in such a way that the tension between them is preserved? This article expands upon a collaborative research project between the Museum of Anthropology and Archaeology at Cambridge University, University of California, Los Angeles, and the A:shiwi A:wan Museum (...) and Heritage Center to compare descriptions of museum objects by multiple expert communities. We found that narratives and objects in use are key omissions in traditional museum documentation, offering us several possibilities to expand our concept of digital objects. Digital objects will allow members of indigenous source communities to contribute descriptive information about objects to support local cultural revitalization efforts and also to influence how objects are represented in distant cultural institutions. (shrink)

Cultural Heritage, Ethics and Contemporary Migrations breaks new ground in our understanding of the challenges faced by heritage practitioners and researchers in the contemporary world of mass migration, where people encounter new cultural heritage and relocate their own. It focuses particularly on issues affecting archaeological heritage sites and artefacts, which help determine and maintain social identity, a role problematised when populations are in flux. This diverse and authoritative collection brings together international specialists to discuss socio-political and (...) ethical implications for the management of archaeological heritage in global society. With contributions by authors from a range of disciplinary backgrounds, including archaeologists, philosophers, cultural historians and custodians of cultural heritage, the volume explores a rich mix of contrasting, yet complementary, viewpoints and approaches. Among the topics discussed are the relations between culture and identity; the potentialities of museums and monuments to support or subvert a people's sense of who they are; and how cultural heritage has been used to bring together communities containing people of different origins and traditions, yet without erasing or blurring their distinctive cultural features. Cultural Heritage, Ethics and Contemporary Migrations is a crucial text for archaeologists, curators, policymakers and others working in the heritage field, as well as for philosophers, political scientists and other readers interested in the links between immigration and cultural heritage. (shrink)

Drawing on debates about Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) safeguarding at the local and international level, Intangible Cultural Heritage and Sustainable Development: Inside a UNESCO Convention, explores the theoretical and practical implications of the intertwinement between these policy fields. Considering how Sustainable Development (SD) priorities are influencing representations of ICH, the volume questions how they are expanding the frontiers of the heritage realm and unsettling accepted understandings of the social uses of heritage. The contributing authors, who hail (...) from a variety of different contexts and disciplinary backgrounds, explore these issues from a unique vantage point as both scholars and actors of the processes they analyze. Playing different roles in the implementation of the Convention, their positioning as insiders allows for a unique analytical perspective that is based on first-hand engagement with the practices of the Convention. Intangible Cultural Heritage and Sustainable Development: Inside a UNESCO Convention sheds light on the complexity, potential and consequences of combining ICH and SD at the policy-making level and in heritage practices on the ground. It will be of interest to academics and students working in heritage studies, development studies, anthropology, archaeology, international law, political science, international relations and sociology. (shrink)

Nations and states build their identity on cultural heritage, which in the public space becomes a symbol of society’s collective memory. Cultural heritage has always been understood as a trace of the embodiment of a nation in space and time, that is, in a certain historical context. Also, cultural heritage and its monuments are closely related to identity and regularly contain a series of symbolic messages that demonstrate the history and destiny of the people. Heritage is (...) one of the important factors in the process of globalization, more precisely in the preservation of the identity of an individual nation in that process. The globalization process takes place quickly and therefore it is necessary to quickly and permanently educate oneself about cultural heritage, which is also an important factor in recognizing the tradition and identity of a nation. Quality education is one of the important goals of sustainable development, and it also implies the preservation and presentation of heritage content. The paper examines the connection between cultural heritage, education and sustainable development. (shrink)

The digital society is reconfiguring the relationships between digital culture and intercultural citizenship in Peru. To understand these connections, it is important to examine thesis reports presented in Peruvian universities. Conceptual mapping is used as a research method, allowing for the identification of emerging thematic connections. The results demonstrate a growing interest in research on digital culture and intercultural citizenship in Peru, as well as the interconnections and gaps that highlight national inequalities. Essentially, the need for public policies (...) that promote digital culture, and an active and participatory intercultural citizenship online is revealed. (shrink)

The information regime is mediated by the culture of the electronic device. It is characterized by the control of the deluded citizen through the deployment of freedom, thereby nullifying the core issue of human life: freedom. Through phenomenological-hermeneutic methodology (Heidegger, 2002), this work starts from the world of digital life to direct the interpretation towards digital governance, all of which appears as a hermeneutic horizon the information regime. It is concluded that in this new social order the political and (...) all other orders that arise from interaction are governed by a capitalism of emotions. (shrink)

Do members of cultural groups have special claims to own or control the products of the cultures to which they belong? Is there something morally wrong with employing artistic styles that are distinctive of a culture to which you do not belong? What is the relationship between cultural heritage and group identity? Is there a coherent and morally acceptable sense of cultural group membership in the first place? Is there a universal human heritage to which everyone has (...) a claim? Questions such as these concern the ethics of cultural heritage (or heritage ethics, for short). This entry seeks to provide an overview of the philosophical work on topics in heritage ethics, as well as introduce readers to some of the most philosophically relevant literature from other disciplines. (shrink)

Faced with this divergence of views, the studies in this book therefore focus on the broader issue of whether archaeologists and other cultural heritage experts should ever work with the military, and if so, under what guidelines and ...

The concept of cultural heritage employs specific discourses, codes, values, and images that contain assumptions about a particular community and its members. Among the constitutive elements of a common heritage firmly stand language, history and territory. The contents of the cultural heritage are frequently socially, politically, culturally, and historically contested, which reveals competition among past, present, and future narratives that shape the existing national identities or lead to the creation of new ones. The paper examines the role (...) of law in “defining” cultural heritage and “attributing” it to a particular community. In this respect the case of North Macedonia represents a unique case study on how international law embedded in the bilateral agreements with Bulgaria and Greece have shaped the past, present and future identity of that nation. It explores how the legal norms can shape the “attribution” of the cultural heritage by issuing legally binding interpretations of the historical events and personalities, usage of names and designations, and even the features of a language. (shrink)

Over the coming decades, the so-called telematic technologies are destined to grow more and more encompassing in scale and the repercussions they will have on our professional and personal lives will become ever more accentuated. The transformations resulting from the digitization of data have already profoundly modified a great many of the activities of human life and exercise significant influence on the way we design, draw up, store and send documents, as well as on the means used for locating information (...) in libraries, databases and on the net. These changes are transforming the nature of international communication and are modifying the way in which we carry out research, engage in study, keep our accounts, plan our travel, do our shopping, look after our health, organize our leisure time, undertake wars and so on. The time is not far off when miniaturized digital systems will be installed everywhere - in our homes and offices, in the car, in our pockets or even embedded within the bodies of each one of us. They will help us to keep control over every aspect of our lives and will efficiently and effectively carry out multiple tasks which today we have to devote precious time to. As a consequence, our ways of acting and thinking will be transformed. These new winds of change, which are blowing strongly, are giving birth to a new culture to which the name ‘digital culture’ has been given. It is timely that a study should be made of the different aspects and consequences of this culture, but that this study should not be just undertaken from the point of view of the simple user who quickly embraces the latest successful innovation, in reaction essentially to market forces. The major challenge for this culture resides not so much in the development of even more tiny microchips, faster processors or more refined software, but in the honing of conceptual instruments which will give us the ability to analyse and evaluate the radical changes that this revolution is bringing about and which it will continue to provoke in all of our lives. (shrink)

The International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), strongly believes that heritage—natural and cultural, tangible and intangible—is fundamental to addressing the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This paper explores Liangzhu cultural heritage located in Hangzhou, China. It argues that cultural heritage is also a special kind of living narrative. In accordance with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, cultural heritage narratives carry an important function in global sustainable development. Cross-media narrative development of Liangzhu site (...) and ancient symbols are explored, from the appearance of elements like "The God with Mixed Human and Animal Facial Features" in design products, to the consideration of the pioneer integration of 5G technology taking place in the city of Hangzhou, an example of sustainable urban development. (shrink)

Privacy is a sociocultural perception, depending on the dominant values of a society, sociocultural heritage, and contemporary technological developments. This article focuses on privacy perception among adolescents based on a European school survey (PRACTIS), and presents comparative results of an exploratory study conducted among over 1,428 adolescents in six countries. The results reveal that adolescents attribute high value to privacy and are prepared to actively oppose if an online corporation is challenging their personal interests. However, they tend to trade (...) off privacy for other perceived benefits. Adolescents’ privacy perception and data protection are affected by cultural diversity, age, gender, and most of all their various social network sites activities and their attitudes toward importance of sharing and controlling personal information. (shrink)

Walter Benjamin’s 1936 essay, ‘The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction’, constitutes one of the earliest reflections on the way in which the cultural experience and interpretation is transformed by the advent of what were then the ‘new’ media technologies of photography and film. Benjamin directs attention to the way in which these technologies release cultural objects from their unique presence in a place and make them uniformly available irrespective of spatial location. The way in which old (...) media technologies apparently obliterate the place of cultural objects is also a feature of new media. However, the apparent obliteration of place that occurs in this way is itself problematic, in giving rise to a loss of the sense of spatial and temporal distance, and so of the relative locatedness of both experiencing subject and interpreted object. The loss of a sense of the place of the object threatens a loss of the sense of place of the subject, and with it, a loss of a proper sense of heritage as such. (shrink)