The Role of Participatory Cultural Mapping in Promoting Intercultural Dialogue: We Are Not Hyenas; a Reflection Paper; 2010
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United Nations Educational, Scientic and Cultural Organization The role of Participatory cultural mapping in promoting intercultural dialogue ‘We are not hyenas’ A Refl ection Paper The role of participatory cultural mapping in promoting intercultural dialogue ‘We are not hyenas’ A Reflection Paper This paper was prepared by Dr. Nigel Crawhall for the UNESCO Division of Cultural Policies and Intercultural Dialogue in February 2007. All rights reserved. This document may be freely reviewed, abstracted, reproduced or translated, in part or in whole, but not for sale or for use in conjunction with commercial purposes, provided that mention is made of the source. © November 2009. United Nations Education, Scientifi c and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) The designations employed and the presentation of material throughout this document do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of UNESCO concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or its authorities, or concerning its frontiers or boundaries. Cover photo: Native Fijians locating cultural heritage sites (red pins) on the 1:10,000-scale participatory 3D model of Ovalau Island, Fiji, 2005. (Note: the participatory 3D modelling (P3DM) process on Ovalau Island was granted the 2007 World Summit Award in the category e-culture & heritage http://www.wsis-award.org/ winner/intangible-cultural-heritage-fi ji-50320100624.) Photo credit: Giacomo Rambaldi ©/CTA CLT-2010 /WS/1 – cld: 4203.9 Table of contents Introduction . 5 What is cultural mapping? . 7 Mental maps . 7 The origins of modern “cultural” mapping . 8 Why is cultural mapping important for UNESCO? . 11 Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003) . 12 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions (2005) . 13 Cultural mapping in UNESCO . 15 Main lessons learned . 15 Is cultural mapping effective in developing intercultural dialogue? . 17 Making the intangible tangible . 17 Mapping as a communication bridge . 18 A matter of different perceptions . .19 Revitalising culture and the intergenerational transmission of knowledge . 21 The role of the State: opportunities for new partnerships . 23 Conclusion . 25 Appendix 1: Selected UNESCO materials and workshops related to cultural mapping UNESCO-commissioned papers related to cultural mapping . 27 References and Resources . 29 Introduction Cultural mapping involves the representation of aspirations, to help civil servants and policy makers landscapes in two or three dimensions from the evaluate how mapping can be a useful tool in cultural perspectives of indigenous and local peoples. policy and inventory work, and for those who are It is potentially an important tool1 for UNESCO in making maps to refl ect on their practices. its efforts to help Member States and civil society to create platforms for intercultural dialogue, The title of the paper refers to a moment of and increase awareness of cultural diversity as a intercultural dialogue during a Participatory resource for peace building, good governance, 3-Dimensional Modelling exercise with the Ogiek fi ghting poverty, adaptation to climate change and indigenous people of Kenya in 2005. Participants maintaining sustainable management and use of from industrialised and agricultural societies were natural resources. surprised that the Ogiek had very few recognisable footpaths on their cultural map. The Ogiek Cultural mapping, if applied wisely, can help participants, supported by other hunter-gatherers, to reach the objectives set out in the UNESCO pointed out that only hyenas go back on their Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity2 (2001) tracks. Different perspectives on what counts as and related recent conventions: the Convention for ‘normal’ are part of the surprise element in effective the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage3 intercultural dialogue. What for one group of people (2003) and the Convention on the Protection and is essentially human behaviour, is considered Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions4 typical of hyenas to other observers. Assumptions (2005). Cultural mapping is furthermore relevant about values, perspectives and even topography to the World Heritage Convention5, which dates can be misleading and false. back to 1972, but has undergone major changes since then, expanding the notion of a cultural site At the February 2006 UNESCO colloquium on and promoting stronger involvement of populations “New Perspectives on Cultural Diversity: the living on the sites. Role of Communities” held in Havana, Cuba, a team of experienced mapping specialists, who The aim of this paper is to critically consider how have been working with indigenous and local cultural mapping can become a good practice of communities, prepared a Havana Communiqué intercultural dialogue and successfully further the on Cultural Mapping6. This paper builds on their aims of the Universal Declaration and the related work. conventions. The paper is meant to assist indigenous and local peoples to consider their options and The primary emphasis of this report is on the different perceptions that indigenous peoples, particularly in Africa, can have of their situation, 1 Rambaldi emphasises that participatory mapping is about good practices, rather than tools. In this paper, we note that needs and choices. However, it can also be relevant mapping can be a tool for communities within their cultural for other non-dominant minority voices, such as resource management strategies, and that attention should be given to good practices when these tools are applied. those of women, youth and migrant peoples across 2 See: http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0012/001271/127160m. the globe. pdf 3 See: http://www.unesco.org/culture/ich/index.php 4 See: http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL_ID=31038&URL_ DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html 5 See: http://whc.unesco.org/en/conventiontext/ 6 http://www.dgroups.org/groups/ppgis/docs/ACFB67.pdf 5 What is cultural mapping? Cultural mapping, counter-mapping, community- Mental maps based mapping, participatory mapping – a broad range of cartographic practices have emerged over the last three and a half decades to bring alternative indigenous and local perspectives to the attention of those who hold power and who control what usually appears on offi cial maps. Each initiative had its own motivation and logic. Early work in cultural mapping focused on demonstrating Inuit land use and occupancy patterns that led to disputes over natural resource rights. More recently, mapping has been used for indigenous defence of biological diversity, resolution of armed confl icts, documenting landscapes of dying languages, and for many other purposes. © PAFID – Ephemeral map These mapping practices are to a large extent a Indigenous peoples have many ways of expressing reaction to the type of mapping that emerged spatial information and relationships between during the age of exploration, when maps were locations in their territories. Normally, these would produced by European and Asian explorers and be transmitted orally. San communities in the seafarers (see www.maphistory.info) often under Kalahari still navigate at night using culturally the patronage of powerful monarchs and, later, generated mental maps of star constellations. In mercantile companies. The colonial character of daylight, San people use numerous other clues to mapping is seen in the transformation of indigenous navigate across desert. These include the position and local naming systems into a distorted or fully- of the sun, sand colours and textures, plant varieties replaced naming system that was convenient to and salinity, memories and stories of specifi c trees, the dominant culture. For example, Canadian, and a naming system for pans (fl at indentations Australian, South African and Brazilian place names which gather water after rains) related to mythology were distorted or replaced for the convenience of and practical information about their water quality, the settlers. shape or biological diversity. 7 Some indigenous peoples have engaged in map- The origins of modern making for centuries if not longer. Derek Elias “cultural” mapping (2001), among others, has studied the intangible maps of Aboriginal peoples in Australia, who understand their landscapes based on the Indigenous and colonial traditions both clashed movement of ancestors and mythical creatures. and interacted over the last centuries. Lewis (1998) The maps are related to songs, family territories, has traced the use of cartography by American and natural and spiritual resources etched on and First Nations back to at least 1540, when American under the landscape. Symbolic physical maps are First Nations worked with Spaniard Hernando de created on story boards, sand drawings and body Alarcón to map the lower Colorado River (Malcolm painting. This aspect of maps surfaces in Barbara Lewis 1998). However, the main contemporary Glowczewski’s work with Warlpiri people (see engagement of Western mapping methodologies the UNESCO CD ‘Dream Trackers: Yapa art and with indigenous knowledge systems occurred in knowledge of the Australian desert’). work concerning the Arctic. Suggest making this into a box, maybe with According to Chapin et al (2005), we can trace the the title “Understanding the heritage of hunter- origin of modern ‘cultural’ mapping to the Canadian gatherers”? and Alaskan Arctic from the late 1960s onwards. Geographers and indigenous people found that Warlpiri people