Cultures and Globalization
Heritage, Memory and Identity
- Helmut K Anheier - Hertie School of Governance, Germany, University of Heidelberg, Germany
- Yudhishthir Raj Isar - The American University of Paris, France
Communication and Media Studies (General) | Cultural Studies (General) | Sociology of Culture
Heritage, memory and identity are closely connected keywords of our time, each endowed with considerable rhetorical power. Different human groups define certain objects and practices as 'heritage'; they envision heritage to reflect some form of collective memory, either lived or imagined; and they combine both to construct cultural identities. Today, the three terms raise conjoined issues of practice, policy and politics in an increasingly globalized world.
Bringing together a truly global range of scholars, this volume explores heritage, memory and identity through a diverse set of subjects, including heritage sites, practices of memorialization, museums, sites of contestation, and human rights.
This volume is of one of the most comprehensive in the field. Its three themes are critical for the study of culture and globalization with its condensation of space, time and memory. Heritage is the things from the past which people consider worth conserving and memorialising. Memory is the selective recall of significant cultural values and practices, especially in the context of migration and diaspora-formation. Identities are the self-definitions which individuals and groups construct for themselves and which heritage and memory have helped to shape. The essays explore the intersection between these three processes. They are learned, deeply researched and insightful, and the comparative range is impressive. The volume is certain to become a standard reference text for scholars and the general reader alike
Stuart Hall
Emeritus Professor of Sociology at the Open University
Anyone interested in the meaning of trans-national cultural life needs to read this book. As these essays disclose, the collective which remembers collectively today is now composed of men and women whose lives and families fragment with dizzying speed. That is why the terms memory, identity, and heritage matter so much. As a guide for the perplexed, this powerful assembly of essays contributes more than any other I know to disclosing and clarifying the complex spatial and temporal interactions governing cultural practices no longer confined to the nation state
Jay Winter
Charles J. Stille Professor of History, Yale University
