Reviews
Reviews
Article Type: Reviews From: Journal of Cultural Heritage Management and Sustainable Development, Volume 2, Issue 2.
Books
Rethinking Cultural Resource Management in Southeast Asia. Preservation, Development, and Neglect
Edited by John N. Miksic, Geok Yian Goh and Sue O’Connor
This book offers the first detailed analysis of the many factors that contribute to the current state of cultural resource management in Southeast Asia. It gives an overview on the region and then thoroughly details the difficulty of effective cultural resource management, by surveying significant challenges by sub-region, covering a large part of the region through a series of case studies. Culprits include tourism, economic development, poor management and lack of resources. The book stimulates the rethinking of old approaches in cultural heritage management, and it also recognizes the difficulty of applying Euro-American approaches in Southeast Asia, and proposes the development of region-specific cultural resource management strategies.
Source: www.anthempress.com/index.php/rethinking-cultural-resource-management-in-southeast-asia.html
City: A User's Guide to the Past, Present, and Future of Urban Life
Edited by P.D. Smith
P.D. Smith's first book about cities is ambitious. It is a guide to 7,000 years of urban living, from the ziggurats of Sumer to the global gateway cities of today. Following the lead of Lewis Mumford's The City in History(1961), City is a more utilitarian guidebook to our urbanity. The format follows that of a tourist guidebook, covering history, customs, language,districts, transport, money, work, shops, markets, even tourist sites. Unlike a typical guidebook, however, City explains how all these icons of urban development work; he shows to be a journalist and a researcher. The book is illustrated with full-colour photographs, maps and other images.
Past events
Conserving the City: Critical History and Urban Conservation 28 April 2012, Philadelphia, USA
Sponsors: Graduate Program in Historic Preservation, PennDesign, University of Pennsylvania; Historic Preservation Program, School of Architecture,Preservation and Planning, University of Maryland-College Park
Organizers: Michele Lamprakos, Randall Mason
This was the first in a series of symposia that aim to advance knowledge about urban conservation, held at the University of Pennsylvania's School of Design. The history of conservation, as a general field, is only now being charted. Even less has been written about the history of conserving cities:operations like rebuilding, protection, renewal and regeneration have long played an important role in the management and design of urban environments, but these are barely treated in standard histories. The symposium began to address this gap through case studies of urban conservation thinking and practice in a wide range of social and historical settings – in Europe, the Middle East and Asia. Proceedings will be published as an edited volume, to prepare the ground for a critical history of urban conservation.
Heritage 2012, 3rd International Conference on Heritage and Sustainable Development 19-22 June 2012, Porto, Portugal
Organizers: Green Lines Institute for Sustainable Development
Summary by Johan Swart
The historic centre of Porto was an inspirational background for Heritage 2012, which took place in Portugal from 19 to 22 June 2012. Gathering in the magnificent “Palácio da Bolsa”, delegates listened to keynote speaker Michéle Prats delivering the opening talk themed “Heritage, a driver for development”. She discussed the complicated role of heritage within the context of development in current society. This set the scene for a great variety of presentations and discussions that positioned heritage within environmental,economic, political and cultural concerns. A multitude of research questions and possible solutions arising from such themes were presented and debated by over 200 researchers and practitioners from across the globe.
American Planning Association National Conference 14-17 April 2012, Los Angeles, USA
The four-day conference featured more than 200 conference sessions and 65 mobile workshops that focus on a variety of topics such as demographic changes,transit-oriented development, alternative energy, food systems and public health. One major trend at this year's conference was how to use technology for planning. New technologies make information more publically accessible than ever before, allowing individuals, organizations and government to communicate information more quickly, and to a broader audience. Social media was lauded as a tool for participatory planning, and crowd sourcing and crowd funding were suggested as potential sources of inspiration and even financing for public projects.
Source: www.planning.org/conference
Tools and web sites
Discovering Places is London 2012's Cultural Olympiad campaign to inspire communities across the UK to discover their local environment – with all its hidden places, extraordinary spaces and the stories they have to tell. Discovering Places aims to intrigue and surprise people, giving everyone the opportunity to discover, explore and be inspired by the UK's hidden gems; from historic or contemporary buildings to public or natural spaces in and around the cities, towns and villages where we live and work. Discovering Places is one of the major projects of the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad, managed by The Heritage Alliance and delivered in partnership with the London 2012 Organising Committee of the 2012 Olympic and Paralympics Games (LOCOG). The Heritage Alliance,established in 2002 as Heritage Link, is the biggest alliance of heritage interests in the UK and was set up to promote the central role of the non-government movement in the heritage sector.
Cities of Opportunities presents data and tools to analyse and understand a collection of 26 cities reflecting a balance between mature and emerging economies. It guides you trough the data gathered for the fourth edition of Cities of Opportunity (2011). The study analyses and ranks how 26 global centres of finance, business and culture perform across ten categories of 66 key indicators; it examines urban issues and adds insight from urban thinkers and influencers. The main aim of this edition remains to try and shed light on what makes major cities healthy. The research singles out a few of the challenges that are most pressing at the moment, such as regional management,education, sustainability, density, transportation and preservation.
The Codes Project, developed under the guidance of Professor Emily Talen at Arizona State University in the USA is an anthology of the codes, laws and related documents that have created, or sought to create, particular urban forms. It is a searchable archive with selected documents from around the world,and from all time periods. The documents provide a rich cultural resource for urban planners, architects and all others involved in the construction of place. From the Code of Hammurabi to Seaside, Florida's Urban Code, one can download PDFs and compare these historic regulations. Additionally, one can do a“Synoptic Survey” to perform an urban analysis.
Source: http://codesproject.asu.edu/
Loes Veldpaus and Molly Turner
