Benefitting country(ies): Albania

Overview:

Implemented by the Ministry of Culture, the 26-month project aimed at carrying out a community-based inventory of intangible cultural heritage in Albania, with a view to drawing up tailored action plans for its safeguarding and transmission to future generations. Though considerable efforts had already been undertaken to safeguard living heritage in Albania, a thorough national inventory of intangible cultural heritage including communities was yet to be compiled. To address this situation, the project involved drawing up an inventorying methodology and initiating inventorying work in three selected districts of Albania. As a first step, a tailored methodology was compiled through a scheme of training and workshops; secondly, living heritage elements in the selected regions were inventoried, including those of five ethno-linguistic minorities. Specifically, the project aimed at: creating a mechanism to better involve communities in the safeguarding process; improving and expanding upon the limited national inventory in the selected regions; and strengthening the transmission of living heritage-related knowledge and skills in the three regions. The communities and bearers were the focus of the project, which distinguished it from previous inventory-making activities undertaken in the country, and the project was expected to lead to the compilation of a complete national inventory by the end of 2022.

News and activities:

• 2023-10-30 – Training for new generation of facilitators from Europe and North America

22/03/2019 - 09/11/2022 – Community-based inventorying and transmission of intangible cultural heritage in the island of Tongatapu in Tonga01/04/2022 - 01/09/2022 – Assessing the needs of living heritage safeguarding among displaced communities from Ukraine in five neighboring countries: Hungary, Moldova, Poland, Romania and Slovakia