"Cultural Landscapes in the 21st Century: Laws, Management and Public Participation: Heritage as a Challenge of Citizenship".
The Tenth International Seminar of the network of universities Forum UNESCO - University and Heritage will be hosted by the International Centre for Cultural and Heritage Studies (ICCHS) at the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne, U.K, from 11 to 16 April 2005 on the theme Cultural Landscapes in the 21st Century, Laws, Management, and Public Participation: heritage as a challenge of citizenship.
Humans have always interacted with their environment and helped to create and modify the landscapes in which they live. The last decade or so has seen not only a significant increase in the scope, and in some instances, speed of such developments, but also of our appreciation and understanding of these changes. These range from the suggested impact of global warming, through localised changes in agricultural practice and a variety of forms of economic exploitation, fronted perhaps by developments in tourism, to developments in how landscapes are viewed and studied academically. These, and many other developments, have led to the increased management of landscapes and to more extensive formal protection within national and regional laws. Some argue this has been at the expense of local community interaction with, and control over, their own local environments.
This Seminar will look at landscapes in all of their possible manifestations, through a wide variety of academic disciplines and through the voices of some of those who live and interact with landscapes. It will investigate the supposed division between cultural and natural landscapes and question the value of this division.
The Seminar is arranged around seven major themes linking Cultural Landscapes with Museums and Heritage (Tangible and Intangible), Visual Culture, Identities and Communities, Tourism and Economics, Architecture, Education and finally, Management and Protection.
For more information:
Ms. Marie-Louise Kerr
Tel. (44) 191 222 7419
Fax (44) 191 222 5564