Seminar by Michael Rowlands: The Dignity of Heritage?

This seminar has been organised in the framework of the DigiDogon project.

The ideals of human dignity are precious to us all. The question in the title of this seminar by Michael Rowlands poses aims to address the issue of critical heritage studies. As an anthropologist, Rowlands has no hesitation making such a universal statement about the nature of humanity. It does not mean that dignity and its preservation is experienced in similar ways. Preserving dignity in the face of humiliation, loss of identity and, more loosely, in the shaping of moral and social values is undeniably specific to experience. Many would say that preserving dignity demands justice - a means to preserve the ideals of being human and deny the legitimacy of inhuman or dehumanising acts. But this should also imply a growing equation of justice and law that critical heritage must question. Inherent to justice as a modern political ideal are citizenship, equal rights, autonomy and the rule of law. But heritage justice does not necessarily imply any of this. If it does, then it suggests our concept of heritage needs redefining.