Prerequisits:

There are no specific prerequisites. However, prior knowledge of basic theories and research methods in ethnology, anthropology, folklore studies, cultural heritage studies, or related fields—is recommended.

Content (Syllabus outline)

1. Conceptualizing heritage – overview of the research paradigms:

• Disciplinary differences and interdisciplinary approaches – from preservation of monuments and museology to heritology and (critical) heritage studies
• Beyond essentialisms – constructivist and performative paradigms;
• Multiperspectivity – alternative voices and authorised heritage discourse.

2. Historical overview of heritage institutionalization in Slovenia (in comparison to neighbouring countries and world processes):

• Heritage prehistory – museological, conservation, and documentational preservation of cultural elements;
• Institutionalization of heritage – Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage (1972) and its impact on national legislation;
• Democratization of heritage ¬– Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003) as an attempt towards its pluralisation and the empowerment of bearers.

3. Overview of heritage management and (ab)use:

• Heritage registers – overview of heritage lists and a reflection on taxonomy, the power relations involved in the registration and branding of heritage, and the consequences of unescoization and other forms of heritage branding;
• Heritage in the identity policies of nationalization, regionalization and (g)localization – heritage and identity;
• Representation and reproduction of heritage;
• Heritage as economic potential (most notably in the tourism industry, as well as in other economy fields – agriculture, craft, food business, marketing).

4. Selected chapters:

• Heritage and materiality
• Heritage in the digital environment
• Foodways and heritage
• Dwelling culture and heritage
• Heritage and economic development
• Heritage in the mobile world
• Heritagization of landscape
• Heritage as commons

Readings

• Adell, N., Bendix, R. F., Bortolotto, C., Tauschek, M. (ur.) 2015. Between Imagined Communities and Communities of Practice, Participation, Territory and the Making of Heritage. Göttingen Studies 8. Göttingen: University of Göttingen.
• Bendix, R., Eggert, A., Peselmann, A. (ur.) 2012. Heritage Regimes and the State. Göttingen Studies 6. Göttingen: University of Göttingen.
• Delak Koželj, Z. 2009. Etnologija in varstvo naravne in kulturne dediščine. Ljubljana: Zavod za vasrtvo kulturne dediščine.
• Dolžan Eržen, T., Slavec Gradišnik I., Valentinčič Furlan N. (ur).2014. Interpretacije dediščine. Ljubljana: Slovensko etnološko društvo.
• Emerick, K. 2014. Conserving and Managing Ancient Monuments: Heritage, Democracy, and Inclusion. Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer.
• Fikfak, J., Podjed, D., Bajuk Senčar, T. (ur.) 2014. Triglavski narodni park: akterji, dediščine. Ljubljana: Založba ZRC.
• Godina Golija, M. (2011). Kulturna dediščina druge polovice 19. stoletja v Mariboru – breme ali priložnost. V: Kulturna dediščina industrijskih panog: 11. vzporednice med slovensko in hrvaško etnologijo. Ljubljana: Slovensko etnološko društvo, 48–57.
• Graham, B. J., Howard, P. (ur.) 2008. The Ashgate Research Companion to Heritage and Identity. Burlington: Ashgate Pub. Co.
• Hafstein, V. 2014. Protection as Dispossession: Government in the Vernacular. V: Kapchan, A. (ur.): Cultural Heritage in Transit: Intangible Rights as Human Rights. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 25–57.
• Harrison, R. 2013. Heritage: Critical Approaches. New York: Routledge.
• Hazler, V. 1999. Podreti ali obnoviti?: zgodovinski razvoj, analiza in model etnološkega konservatorstva na Slovenskem. Ljubljana: Rokus.
• Hewison, R. 1987. The Heritage Industry, Britain in a Climate of Decline. London: Methuen.
• Hobsbawm, E. J., Ranger, T. O. (ur.) 1983. The Invention of Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Hudales J., Visočnik, N. (ur). 2005. Dediščina v očeh znanosti. Ljubljana: Filozofska fakulteta, Oddelek za etnologijo in kulturno antropologijo.
• Hudales J., Visočnik, N. (ur). 2005. Dediščina v rokah stroke. Ljubljana: Filozofska fakulteta, Oddelek za etnologijo in kulturno antropologijo.
• Jezernik B. 2010. Kulturna dediščina in identiteta. Ljubljana: Filozofska fakulteta, Oddelek za etnologijo in kulturno antropologijo.
• Kockel, U., Nic Craith, M. 2007. Cultural Heritage as Reflexive Traditions. Houndmills, Basingstoke in New York: Palgrave Macmillian.
• Ledinek Lozej, Š. 2017. Local Cultural Heritage Collections from the Slovenian-Italian Border Region. V: Pinton, S., Zagato, L. (ur.): Cultural Heritage, Scenarios 2015–2017 (Sapere l’Europa, sapere d’Europa 4). Venezia: Edizioni Ca Foscari, 607–622.
• Lowenthal, D. 1985. The Past is a Foreign Country. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Macdonald, S. 1997. A People’s Story? Heritage, Identity and Authenticity. V: Rojek, C., Urry, J. (ur.): Touring Cultures: Transformations of Travel and Theory. London: Routledge, 155–175.
• Macdonald, S. (ur.) 1998. The Politics of Display: Museums, Science, Culture. London, New York: Routledge.
• Macdonald, S. 2003. Museums, National, Postnational and Transcultural Identities. Museum and Society 1, 1–16.
• Poulot, D. 1993. Le sens du patrimoine: Hier et aujourd’hui (note critique). Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales 48/6: 1601-1613
• Silverman, H., Waterton, E., Watson S. 2017 (ur.): Heritage in Action: Making the Past in the Present. Cham: Springer.
• Smith, L. 2006. Uses of Heritage. New York: Routledge.
• Smith, L. 2012. A Critical Heritage Studies? International Journal of Heritage Studies 18/6, 533–540.
• Smith. L., Akagawa, N. 2009 (ur.). Intangible Heritage. London: Routledge.
• Sonkoly, G., Vahtikari, T. 2018. Innovation in Cultural Heritage Research: For an Integrated European Research Policy. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.
• Tschofen, B. 2012. Heritage – Contemporary Uses of Culture Beyond the Everyday. Challenging Ethnography and Cultural Analysis. Traditiones 41/2: 29–40.
• Terčon, N., Vidrih Perko, V. (ur.) 2017. Muzeji, dediščina in kulturna krajina = Museums, heritage and cultural landscape: Zbornik = Acta. Radovljica: Slovensko muzejsko društvo; Ljubljana: Skupnost muzejev Slovenije; Celje: ICOM Slovenija.
• Tunbridge, J. E., Ashworth, G. J. 1996. Dissonant Heritage: The Management of the Past as a Resource in Conflict. Chichester: J. Wiley.
• Židov, N. Jerin, A. 2017. Varovanje nesnovne kulturne dediščine v Sloveniji. Ljubljana: Slovenski etnografski muzej.

Objectives and competences

This course familiarizes students with an overview of the theoretical paradigms and empirical perspectives of heritage engagement, as well as the more recent processual and multiperspective understandings of heritage practices and processes. The central learning objectives of the course include the understanding of heritage-making in connection with practices and processes of (collective, and also personal) remembrance (and forgetting), and development policies (pertaining to identity or economics) with their inherent power dynamics. Students learn the history of heritage discourses in Slovenia, consider the main disciplinary differences and paradigmatic turns of conceptualizing and theorizing heritage in the humanities, and, based on case studies and their own empirical work, acquire the competencies of recognition, interpretation and discernment of productive and non-productive assumptions, motivations and intentions of heritage practices.

Intended learning outcomes

Students are:

1. familiarized with different research paradigms – from various disciplinary traditions to critical heritage studies;
2. get historical overview of de heritage and heritage-making development;
3. are equipped to analyze or interpret heritage practices and processes and consciously handle the selected element.

Learning and teaching methods:

Types of learning/teaching:

• Frontal teaching
• Work in smaller groups or pair work
• Independent students work
• e-learning

Teaching methods:

• Explanation
• Conversation/discussion/debate
• Work with texts
• Case studies
• Different presentation
• Field work (e.g. company visits)
• Inviting guests from companies

Assessment

• Long written assignment (60 %),
• presentation (20 %),
• final examination (written/oral) (20 %).

Lecturer’s references

• Ledinek Lozej, Š.: Collaborative inventory: a participatory approach to cultural heritage collections. V: NARED, Janez (ur.), BOLE, David (ur.). Participatory research and planning in practice, (The urban book series, ISSN 2365-757X). Cham (Switzerland): Springer Open. cop. 2020, pp. 121-131, doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-28014-7_8.
• Godina-Golija, M., Ledinek Lozej, Š.: Pomen in cilji projektov ohranjanja dediščine prehrane: Register nesnovne kulturne dediščine, Etnofolk in AlpFoodway [The Importance and Objectives of Projects Aimed at Safeguarding Food Heritage: Register of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, Etnofolk and AlpFoodway]. Etnolog, 28, 2018, pp. 85–103.
• Ledinek Lozej, Š., Rogelja Caf, N.: Heritage on the margins?: Central and Eastern European perspectives. Traditiones, 2025, 54/1, pp. 7–16, doi: 3986/Traditio2025540101.
• Ledinek Lozej, Š., Razpotnik Visković, N.: Branding, labelling and certification: Geographical and anthropological insights. Acta geographica Slovenica, 62/2, 2022, pp. 51-61. https://ojs.zrc-sazu.si/ags/issue/view/873/398, doi: 3986/AGS.11265.
• Pisk, M., Ledinek Lozej, Špela. Cross-border landscape as heritage?: insights from Slovenian borderlands. V: PETTENATI, Giacomo (ur.). Landscape as heritage: international critical perspectives. London; New York: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2023, pp. 136–147, doi: 4324/9781003195238-12.
• Ledinek Lozej, Š., Pisk, M.: Collections, walks, and cultural landscapes : Slovenian-Italian cross-border heritage initiatives. Traditiones: Zbornik Inštituta za slovensko narodopisje, 50/1, 2021, pp. 79-105. https://ojs.zrc-sazu.si/traditiones/article/view/10519/9681, doi: 10.3986/Traditio2021500106.