Events and meetings on intangible cultural heritage (co-)organized by UNESCO

The objectives of the meeting were to:

• take stock of the situation as regards the identification and the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage (ICH) in Djibouti, Ethiopia and Somalia;
• learn from the experience of other countries in ICH inventory-making;
• prepare the establishment of the national strategy and methodology concerning ICH inventory-making in Ethiopia.
• discuss the 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage.

The participants included experts from the regional cultural bureaus of Ethiopia, representatives of the communities, NGOs, researchers and an expert each from Djibouti and Somalia. The meeting also welcomed a resource person from and IPHAN, Brazil ((Instituto do patrimonio historico e artistico nacional/National Institute for Historic and Artistic Heritage) and the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage Section in Paris.

• Final report (English)

Contact: OHINATA, Fumiko, UNESCO Addis Ababa Office

Participants related their experiences on the management of the implementation of the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage in view of the entry into force of the 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage in April 2006. The working sessions focussed on:

• Legislative initiatives for the safeguarding of intangible heritage;
• Ways of involving practitioners and communities in safeguarding projects;
• Experiences in encouraging the transmission of intangible cultural heritage;
• Creation of institutions and inventories devoted to intangible cultural heritage.

The Intangible Heritage Section, in close cooperation with the African Academy of Languages (ACALAN), has launched an initiative to promote African languages. The objective of the project is threefold:

1. to strengthen the national and regional institutional capacities for language preservation (at African universities, national research institutes and in regional institutions),
2. to promote south-south and north-south cooperation in Sub-Saharan Africa and
3. to foster the implementation of national language policies, which are so often disregarded due to the lack of resources and trained specialists.

The project, funded by the Government of Norway, was based on a questionnaire-survey among over 80 university departments and research institutions working in the field of African languages in Sub-Saharan African. The survey allowed to establish a state of the art of their current activities in research and education, to assess major needs and to single out the main issues to be addressed by this project.

Based on these findings, a first expert meeting in Bamako, organized in closed cooperation with ACALAN, brought together about 50 linguists, representatives of the university departments, national and regional research institutions from all over Sub-Saharan Africa that participated in the UNESCO survey. The aim of the meeting was to provide a platform for exchange, to promote cooperation and to establish an optimal strategy and priorities for further action in favour of African languages.

• Background paper (English)
• Agenda (English)
• List of participants (English)

This expert meeting provided an opportunity for experts from northern and southern Sudan to learn more about the methodology used in the inventorying of intangible cultural heritage. This event was part of the Culture programme “Strengthening respect for cultural diversity towards intercultural dialogue and reconciliation in Sudan”, which was approved in the 2006 UN Work Plan for Sudan.

• Agenda (English)
• List of participants (English)
• Final report and recommendations (English)
• Presentations of experts:
  • Mr Abdal Rahman: Safeguarding and Revitalizing Craftsmanship in Sudan (English)
  • Mr Abdelrahim Mugaddam: Language situation in Blue Nile (English)
  • Mr Al-Amin Abu-Manga: Linguistic Diversity and Language Endangerment in Sudan (English)
  • Mr Ali Al-Daw: Music for peace (English)
  • Mr Ali Osman: Eskale Water Wheel in the Eyes of a Nubian (English)
  • Ms Asia Mahgoub El-Hindi: Fashoda as a Cultural Space (English)
  • Mr Farah Eisa Mohamed: AL Zariba Cultural Space (English)
  • Mr Girham Abdelgadir: Tourism and Peace: With Special Reference to Nuba Wrestling and Stick Fighting (English)
  • Mr Idris Salem: The Maseed and the Sheikh: an Intangible Cultural Heritage (English)
  • Mr Joshua Ojwok Yor: The installation of the Reth of the Shilluk Kwongo Dak Padiet (English)
  • Mr Large: Preserving and Accessing Knowledge in a Digital Age: The Sudan Open Archive (English)
  • Ms Metje Postma: Audiovisual cultural records: supporting communities in the process of safeguarding their intangible heritage
  • Mr Mohamed El-Mahdi Bushra: Endangered cultures: a case study Merowe Dam (English)
  • Mr Mohammed Haroun Kafi: Role of African God-Man in the Nuba mountains community of Sudan (English)
  • Mr Sayyid Hurreiz: Al Sagia: a Masterpiece of Technological and Socio-economic development (English
  • Mr Yousif Madani: ”Craftmanship: a Heritage of Cultural Syn

This expert meeting is part of a series of encounters organized by UNESCO on core themes concerning the Intangible Cultural Heritage Convention. Previous meetings dealt with Inventory-making (March 2005), the Selection Criteria for Inscription on the Convention’s Lists (December 2005), and Documentation and Archiving (January 2006).

The meeting’s objectives:
1) Provide a forum to exchange ideas and concerns and to elaborate recommendations on:

• The definition of communities and groups in the context of the ICH Convention;
• The involvement of communities and groups in defining, identifying and inventorying their intangible cultural heritage;
• Ensuring the widest possible participation of communities and groups in safeguarding activities;
• Determining ways in which intangible cultural heritage can serve as a factor in development.
  

2) Provide participants with the latest information on the Convention’s ratification status and the preparation of its implementation
3) Discuss ACCU activities and proposals for strengthening regional and sub-regional networks to ensure effective implementation of promotional and safeguarding activities related to the Convention.

The meeting was organized by UNESCO and the Asia/Pacific Cultural Centre for UNESCO (ACCU), in cooperation with Bunkacho (Agency of Cultural Affairs in Japan).

• Final report, conclusions and participants’ list (English|French)
• To download Experts’ Reports (Mr Antonio ARANTES ; Ms Janet BLAKE ; Ms Harriet DEACON ; Ms Margaret FLOREY ; Mr Epeli HAU’OFA ; Mr Garrett KAM ; Mr KONO Toshiyuki ; Ms Kristin KUUTMA ; Mr Philippe LA HAUSSE DE LALOUVIERE ; Ms Kimberley LAWSON ; Mr LUNGTEN Gyatso ; Mr Thabo MANETSI ; Mr Adam NAYYAR  ; Ms Diana Alicia N’DIAYE ; Ms Faustina K. REHUHER ; Mr Ahmed SKOUNTI ; Mr Vellorimo SUMINGUIT ; Ms Huism TAN ; Mr UEMURA Shozo), please consult the page maintained by ACCU:
  http://www.accu.or.jp/ich/en/reports/reports1.html

This expert meeting was aimed at assisting UNESCO in the elaboration of the outline of a Manual on Oral Traditions and Expressions and at advising on potential authors. The Manual is one out of a planned series of several thematic publications that address specific domains of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) and are meant to facilitate the implementation of the 2003 Convention. It will help the States-Parties in developing inventories and carrying out actual safeguarding measures and activities.

The five experts who participated in the meeting did so in their personal capacity and were selected on the basis of their competences and of regional considerations.

During the two days of the meeting, the experts discussed and revised a draft structure of the Manual, as presented by the Intangible Heritage Section of UNESCO. They also discussed and refined a form for inventorying elements of ICH and considered some definitions of the Glossary Intangible Cultural Heritage, prepared by an international expert meeting in June 2002.

The experts also exchanged their personal experiences and examples of good practices of safeguarding oral traditions and expressions.

• Agenda (English)
• Final report, including list of participants and draft structure of the manual (English)

Documenting and archiving intangible cultural heritage serve different purposes within the framework of the 2003. The expert meeting was thus convened in order:

1. to discuss diverse ways in which the documenting and archiving of the intangible cultural heritage could be done and used for the sake of the 2003 Convention,
2. to study the needs for documentation created by the 2003 Convention, and
3. to establish what approaches and practices suit the best various purposes of the Convention and what new approaches have to be investigated.

Twenty-four international experts from 23 countries, representing different disciplines and different perspectives, were invited to participate in the meeting in their personal capacity for their experience in the practice of producing, processing, storing, and making accessible documentation of ICH element. It is envisaged that outcomes of the meeting would contribute towards the elaboration of thematic manuals on the safeguarding of different domains of the intangible cultural heritage, which are currently under preparation, and also offer a number of complementary and/or alternative methods and methodologies for documenting and archiving ICH for different goals.

• Agenda (English|French)
• Background paper (English|French)
• List of participants (English - French)
• Meeting report (English)