Islam,Heritage, and Preservation: An Untidy Tradition

Abstract

In this article I argue that the study of cultural heritage preservation practices in the context of Muslim societies has been constructed—and obstructed—through specific historical trajectories and challenges. These originate within the field of cultural heritage preservation, through its own history and principles which have complicated the interplay between heritage and religious values and uses. As a result, situated studies of preservation practices in and by Muslim communities are in their infancy. In this article I revisit the points of contact between the emergence of a Eurocentric preservation dogma and its encounter with different articulations and practices related to Islam that are now approached as part of heritage assemblages and debates. I consider specific biases inherent in these discourses and propose, as a result, to approach the study of Islam and heritage in its own terms—rather than as an alternative to Western preservation paradigms.     

Landscape,heritage and technological innovation: towards a framework of sustainability of cultural landscape in a desert town in India

Landscape heritage and Landscape justice are recent concepts in landscape studies. Landscape heritage speaks about listening to multiple voices in decision-making on landscape and heritage, especially listening to non-experts, and indigenous voices. Landscape justice is about ensuring equal access to natural resources/natural landscape. The study is based on Jaisalmer, a desert town with the only living fort in Asia, located in Thar Desert at the India–Pakistan border. The study proposes a conceptual framework on the sustainability of cultural landscape that is used to reflect peoples’ livelihood around (lack of access to) water. The framework identifies three main dimensions: the shifting natural landscape, unrecognised critical (tangible and intangible) heritage and challenges with water post-Indira Gandhi Canal project, a central government intervention for desert greening.     

中国传统城市形态的精神功能——以广州为例#br#

中国传统社会中,不同的宗教观念和属于上层社会精英与底层普通民众的思想意识都具有某种精神层面的神秘性,这些思想认识参与社会政治运作后,形成一定的社会价值观。中国传统城市形态也体现出某种神秘性,既对个体产生场所意义,也为构成社会秩序服务,实现精神功能。在说明中国传统社会组织特点基础上,以广州为实例阐述传统城市形态的精神功能,并解读城市形态如何在日常的空间体验中,营造精神氛围,强化社会秩序。     

Privacy,modesty, hospitality,and the design of Muslim homes: A literature review

Traditional Islamic teachings and traditions involve guidelines that have direct applications in the domestic sphere. The principles of privacy, modesty, and hospitality are central to these guidelines; each principle has a significant effect on the design of Muslim homes, as well as on the organization of space and domestic behaviors within each home. This paper reviews literature on the privacy, modesty, and hospitality within Muslim homes. Nineteen publications from 1986 to 2013 were selected and analyzed for content related to the meaning of privacy, modesty, and hospitality in Islam and the design of Muslim homes. Despite the commonly shared guidelines for observing privacy, modesty, and hospitality within each home, Muslims living in different countries are influenced by cultural factors that operate within their country of residence. These factors help to shape the architectural styles and use of space within Muslim homes in different ways. Awareness of the multifactorial nature of the influences on the Muslim perception of home and the use of space is necessary for architects, building designers, engineers, and builders to be properly equipped to meet the needs of clients.     

The Production of Local Landscape Heritage: A Case Study in The Netherlands

In their daily surroundings, people perpetually produce heritage, as they experience, assign meaning to and act upon local historical landscape features. We conducted a case study in a peat district in the Netherlands to investigate heritage construction in various local landscape practices. These practices reflected distinctive patterns of routinised activities, motives to engage with these activities, historical landscape artefacts that are deemed valuable and meanings assigned to these artefacts. Across these landscape practices, we identified different modes of producing heritage meanings: (a) driven by landscape aesthetics, (b) framed by potential spatial threats, (c) structured by family roots, and (d) generated by the desire to belong to the community. Our study demonstrates that heritage production can vary a lot even within a relatively homogenous local culture. In addition, our results suggest that heritage is sometimes produced implicitly, rather than explicitly.     

A GIS-based methodology for the appraisal of historical,architectural, and social values in historic urban cores

Historic environments represent the evolution of materials and techniques that have been used for the construction these environments over the centuries. Entering into the study of this field entails working not only on the crafts that have constructed these environments but also on the people who made, used, and reinterpreted them by learning about the craftsmen and the idiosyncrasies of the place. The study has adopted several methodologies as reference to examine the material and cultural reality of the rural region of Valencia, Spain. Through the adaptation of international methodologies, researchers have carried out a digital database that compiles and maps out the results of the Local Character Assessment of ten Histotiric Urban Cores by incorporating the historical, architectural, and social values to reinforce the Territorial Heritage Action Plan. One of the critical innovations adopted by this form of assessment is the compulsory integration of tangible and intangible heritage through the active involvement of users and makers. Another innovation is to understand the values behind the dynamism and transformation of historic sites. Hence, this study advances theory and practice on the transmission of knowledge among artisans, researchers, and the population and how contemporary practices help acquire new meanings that overlap the past ones.     

Truth,Vision, and the Market: Selling Religion in the Suqs of Damascus

This article examines merchants’ shop displays in the marketplaces of Damascus, Syria, with a focus on Islamic texts and images. In Damascus, most merchants’ businesses, from the air-conditioned to the mobile vending cart, are decorated with a wide range of religious props, photographs, posters, and texts hung on walls, displayed on desks, and nestled amongst merchandise. Though it would be easy to dismiss this décor as a kind of inconsequential backdrop, I suggest that these displays, packed with symbolism and local meaning, play roles in the selling process that go beyond mere decoration. This in part has to do with their visual nature, which allows merchants to convey important characteristics about themselves in ways that words cannot. It also has to do with their religious nature, which gives the displays the ability to transform people, merchandise, and shop space through their connection to God. In short, these displays exist as a counterbalance to the work of bargaining, hawking, and other kinds of verbal selling tactics. Though most studies of markets focus on these kinds of verbal exchanges, I argue here that the visual side of marketplace transactions is just as central to the selling process.     

深圳南山区“文化遗产绿道”设计研究

深圳南山区曾被誉为“深圳历史文化之根”,文化遗产极为丰富,城市迅速扩展对文化遗产形成巨大冲击。建立“文化遗产绿道”是一种新型历史文化资源保护方法,文章通过对南山区已有绿道进行分析,结合历史文化资源分布特征,构建“文化遗产绿道”,完善补充绿道网络,通过主题段落、艺术介入、活动事件等方式,带动公众参与、促进文化遗产的保护与传承。     

Resident Involvement and Participation in Urban Tourism Development: A Comparative Study in Maun and Gaborone,Botswana

This paper reports a comparative study of urban tourism development in two areas, Maun and Gaborone, located in northern and southeastern Botswana. More specifically, the study evaluated residents’ tourism awareness and its importance in their lives; assessed economic benefits and employment derived from tourism; and examined impacts of tourism and development issues as perceived by the residents. Data were collected via household surveys and key informant interviews between June 2003 and April 2004. Findings indicate that both study sites bear some similarities in terms of infrastructural development and rapid population growth. The study also found that only a small proportion of the local population is employed within the tourism sector and that the vast majority of tourism-related enterprises are foreign-owned. Various recommendations are outlined to increase citizen participation in urban tourism development, most notably in cultural heritage tourism.

Zulu dreamscapes: senses,media, and authentication in contemporary neo-shamanism

Abstract

In Western Europe, Muslims are increasingly demanding the right to amplify the Islamic call to prayer, the azan. Local resistance to the azan has prompted a search for technologized alternatives, of which architectural proposal to use light signals instead of loudspeakers is the only public alternative. By describing the light-azan proposal in the Netherlands, followed by an analysis of the extent to which it has been actually adopted, its association with spirituality is investigated from the perspective of mosque aesthetics negotiations. Aesthetic technologies of ordering physical spaces, in this case a transduction of sound into light, but also the use of glass in mosque architecture, can regulate the extent and quality of Muslims’ presence in European cities. Whether the medium of light can faithfully convey the human voice, however, is bound with questions of religious authority.     

基于“文化再生”理念的佛教文化遗产保护规划——以韶关市大南华地区控制性详细规划为例

我国佛教文化遗产保护与开发存在观念方法缺乏创新、价值准则偏失等问题.其保护规划可运用"文化再生"理念,通过"再造""重现"等方式重新焕发遗产地的生机和活力,通过"新陈代谢"等方式使文化得到有效传承.在具体规划中可采取的策略有可视化策略、体验化策略和媒介化策略.     

德国鲁尔区工业遗产保护与再利用对策考察研究

本文基于现场考察,探讨了在鲁尔区经济衰退与复兴背景下对工业遗产保护与再利用的具体对策,并选取了几个典型工业遗产的实例加以介绍。     

世界遗产研究:德国建筑学教育的新专业

勃兰登堡州理工大学“建筑、土木工程和城镇规划”学院的“世界遗产研究”是目前世界上唯的以联合国教科文组织提出的“世界遗产”概念为研究中心的新专业，它在建筑与规划学院的框架下，以“世界遗产”概念为中心。结合建筑学、生态学、管理学、文化学的理论知识，注重建筑学教育的综合性、跨学科特点，形成了一个全新建筑教育专业。在对此专业介绍的同时，结合其创立思路和教学组织，探讨其对我国建筑教育的借鉴作用。     

民族的现代性——孟加拉国现代建筑之父穆扎鲁尔·伊斯兰姆作品与思想探究

穆扎鲁尔·伊斯兰姆对南亚地区现代建筑发展与现代主义建筑思想的影响有密切联系.通过对孟加拉国建筑师伊斯兰姆所处背景、作品及思想的研究,分析了建筑师设计历程以及背后现代性与地域性的理论支持,探讨了建筑师怎样通过作品回应民族历史使命,以及逐步引申出其现代主义建筑形式背后更深层次的“回归”意图.     

铁路建筑的保护与地区再生——以英国曼彻斯特两座历史火车站为例

本文通过工业城市曼彻斯特两座历史火车站再利用的案例,分析＂遗产引导的再生＂塑造城市新形象、重建文化认同的具体方式,并反思其对中国目前工业遗产保护的意义。     

乡村文化遗产保护开发的历程、方法与实践——基于中法经验的比较

1980年代以来的快速城镇化对中国乡村地区的社会、经济、文化形成了全面冲击,传统村落的文化遗产也遭受了严重的破坏.如何看待文化遗产的价值,如何从被动保护转向可持续利用文化遗产,实现乡村的经济复兴和社会重建——这需要建立国际比较的视角.从“发展历程,制度框架、实施步骤”三个方面,对法国经验进行了梳理,指出:遗产概念的建立是工业化时期法国乡村面对经济衰退、人口减少和文化认同危机的一种积极回应;遗产保护在依托法定规划的同时,也需要行业和地区合约的补充;除了清点和划定保护区,教育培训、宣传推广和旅游开发也成为实施保护的关键步骤.最后,结合实际案例,将中国乡村文化遗产保护的发展历程、现行制度和实施效果与法国经验进行了比较,提出法国经验在中央地方合作、动员社会力量参与、保护与发展并重三方面的借鉴价值.     

城市竞争、职能与竞争力:一个理论分析框架

从分析城市之间激烈竞争的全球背景入手，从理论上初步揭示了城市竞争的本质，并以此为基础，建立了分析城市竞争力的理论研究框架，最后对今后的研究方向提出了看法。     

意大利遗址公园规划设计探究——以罗马图拉真考古遗址公园为例

遗址公园作为遗址保护、展示教育与考古研究的有效途径，在世界范围内得以广泛推广与发展。意大利在文化遗产保护领域走在世界前列，其完备的法律保护制度、成熟的遗产保护理念和文物保护技术都有一定的借鉴意义。以罗马图拉真遗址公园为例，通过对其历史沿革的梳理，从遗址的空间结构和历史时序性上解读遗址时空特性，探讨其在坚持遗址原真性的基础上，如何从遗址保护理念、规划设计策略和实施技术路径3个层面对遗址进行保护与阐释，旨在解析意大利在遗址公园规划设计中的理念与方法，探讨其对于遗址公园建设实践的价值。     

欧洲教堂建筑的适应性再利用研究:对遗产转型的批判性评价

欧洲璀璨的建筑遗产,尤其是基督教和天主教教堂建筑,正处在功能逐渐退化甚至彻底消失的危险境地中。 其主要原因在于西方基督教社会面临的社会变迁连带冲击了大众宗教知识、教会参与度以及圣召的数量。如今, 很多西方国家面临着一个共同的问题,即如何应对众多逐渐遭到弃用的教堂和修道院,以及如何解决随之而来的 关于这些建筑的使用、维护、财务、所有权分配和遗产保护的问题。本文是对濒危遗产的批判性评价。那些已经 失去其原有用途的教堂建筑,未来将何去何从？谁来决定这些建筑该以何种方式,或被退役,或再利用,又或被 拆除？是否还有其他的使用模式？遗产保护会对教堂的再利用产生什么影响？半个世纪以来,我们在与冗余的教 会建筑和适应性再利用的经验中学到了什么？笔者对教堂建筑的各种不尽相同的适应性再利用方式、不断变化的 建筑遗产价值以及可能会在未来发挥作用并能引发中国读者思考的全新决策模式等问题作出回顾性思考。