A Future in Ruins: UNESCO, World Heritage, and the Dream of Peace

Q3 Arts and Humanities
Lauren Van Zandt
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引用次数: 3

Abstract

From May 2015 to March 2017, the Islamic State intermittently occupied the ancient Roman ruins of Palmyra, subjecting the site to destruction and defacement. Palmyra became a figurehead for cultural heritage in danger and an archaeological martyr to ISIS’s vandalous war crimes. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) vowed to correct the senseless destruction of this World Heritage Site. But was the destruction truly senseless? A Future in Ruins posits that it was not and that until UNESCO is willing to truly engage with fraught issues of conservation, the organization is powerless to fulfill its mission “to build peace through international cooperation in Education, the Sciences and Culture.”1 Author Lynn Meskell is an archaeologist and anthropologist, professor at the University of Pennsylvania, professor at large at Cornell University, and honorary professor at the University of the Witwatersrand (Johannesburg, South Africa). She also has personal experience with UNESCO’s impact on heritage sites as an archaeologist and consultant, which she draws on for the book. Meskell’s other significant primary sources are the United Nations (UN) archives, personal papers of British academics and diplomats involved in the early years of UNESCO, and individual conversations with contemporary diplomats and UN staff. A Future in Ruins is an examination of how political realities hobble UNESCO, and its stable of World Heritage Sites, from fully living up to its utopian mission (p. xvii). The World Heritage designation, created to preserve and conserve locations of “outstanding universal value,”2 can inversely be the catalyst of danger and destruction to listed sites. Meskell criticizes UNESCO for focusing on “technical” aspects of physical preservation instead of tackling more challenging holistic issues about the social, political, and economic impacts of an internationalist approach to cultural conservation. A Future in Ruins is divided into two parts delineated by the introduction of the World Heritage List, which came into effect in 1972. The first two chapters examine UNESCO’s founding in the aftermath of the destruction of World War II and UNESCO’s great success salvaging the ancient Egyptian sites of Abu Simbel. Meskell simultaneously explores the lack of international consensus about archaeological standards and the exclusion of research from UNESCO’s mission priorities. The rest of the book is organized by broad themes, jumping Reviews
废墟中的未来:联合国教科文组织、世界遗产与和平之梦
2015年5月至2017年3月,“伊斯兰国”断断续续占领了巴尔米拉古罗马遗址,使该遗址遭到破坏和污损。帕尔米拉成了濒危文化遗产的象征,也是ISIS肆意破坏战争罪行的考古殉道者。联合国教育、科学及文化组织(教科文组织)发誓要纠正对这一世界遗产的无谓破坏。但这种破坏真的毫无意义吗?《废墟中的未来》认为,事实并非如此,除非联合国教科文组织愿意真正参与令人担忧的保护问题,否则该组织无力履行其“通过教育、科学和文化方面的国际合作建立和平”的使命。1作者Lynn Meskell是考古学家和人类学家,宾夕法尼亚大学教授,康奈尔大学客座教授,南非约翰内斯堡威特沃特斯兰德大学名誉教授。作为一名考古学家和顾问,她也有亲身经历联合国教科文组织对遗产遗址的影响,她将这些经历写进了书中。Meskell的其他重要主要资料来源包括联合国档案、参与联合国教科文组织早期工作的英国学者和外交官的个人文件,以及与当代外交官和联合国工作人员的个人对话。《废墟中的未来》考察了政治现实如何阻碍联合国教科文组织及其稳定的世界遗产实现其乌托邦式的使命(第17页)。世界遗产的指定是为了保护和保护具有“突出普遍价值”的地点,反过来却可能成为危险和破坏列入名录的地点的催化剂。Meskell批评联合国教科文组织专注于物理保护的“技术”方面,而不是解决国际主义文化保护方法对社会、政治和经济影响的更具挑战性的整体问题。《废墟中的未来》由1972年生效的《世界遗产名录》的介绍分为两部分。前两章考察了联合国教科文组织在第二次世界大战破坏之后的成立,以及联合国教科文组织在拯救古埃及阿布辛贝神庙遗址方面取得的巨大成功。Meskell同时探讨了关于考古标准缺乏国际共识以及联合国教科文组织将研究排除在任务优先事项之外的问题。这本书的其余部分是根据广泛的主题和跳跃的评论来组织的
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来源期刊
American Archivist
American Archivist Social Sciences-Library and Information Sciences
CiteScore
0.30
自引率
0.00%
发文量
21
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