Newcastle University’s project’s aims are to build awareness, understanding and promotion of the underlying principle of World Heritage as a tool for global peace and international cooperation.
The project is being delivered by heritage consultant David Brough, on behalf of Prof. Peter Stone, UNESCO Chair for Cultural Property Protection and Peace at Newcastle University.
Initial research with several UK WHSs was undertaken in 2021 to establish:
- what is already being done in this regard
- what challenges Sites are facing in doing more
- what might assist with addressing those issues
This was followed by a workshop in February 2022 which sought to identify how some of the ideas emerging from this research might be trialled through a pilot period to gauge what might most effectively support UNESCO’s objective of the promotion of peace. As an outcome of the workshop, it was agreed that a series of resources would be produced explaining UNESCO’s peace mission and how it relates to World Heritage Sites. These resources have now been prepared to assist WHS Coordinators and their colleagues in developing their own materials as appropriate to their individual Sites.
These resources are available to Coordinators via this website’s members’ forum – General Posts/World Heritage & Peace and include:
A core resource document which consists of:
- A series of background explanatory texts on UNESCO’s founding objective and how it relates to World Heritage
- A draft script to accompany a set of template PowerPoint slides
- A set of PowerPoint slides which can be drawn upon in making presentations to different audiences
- An example provided by English Lake District WHS colleagues illustrating how they have attempted to present UNESCO’s peace promotion objective to their audiences
The university hopes that individual Sites may now and over the next several months use these resources to explore how their own WHS might support UNESCO’s objective of the promotion of peace.
In so doing they would like Sites to record how any information and materials presented, or
events and activities undertaken in relation to UNESCO’s vision of peace, have been
received by Site’s own audiences.
The project’s aim is to hold a further on-line workshop in the autumn, in which those Sites
who have been able to undertake some activities in support of the World Heritage and Peace
project can share experiences and report back on the reactions of their audiences to those activities.
In the meantime, any queries about the resources provided or feedback should be directed to David Brough on davidbrough101@btinternet.com
