Background Knowledge: Cultural Heritage and Natural Heritage

In global terms, heritage can be conceived as a communal legacy, usually rooted in a natural or cultural setting and being passed down from one generation to the next. The “1972 Convention concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage” defines heritage into two broad categories “Natural Heritage” and “Cultural Heritage”.

“Natural Heritage” usually boasts iconic natural features and biological assets that are deemed important for scientific conservation, while “Cultural Heritage” embraces physical features such as monuments, groups of buildings, artefacts as well as their intangible attributes which link us to the past. Some of the sites feature both natural and cultural attributes to a certain degree. In this regard, the UNESCO approved the inclusion of a new category “mixed heritage site” to recognise the ones that can fulfil the definition of both natural and cultural heritage.

In a broader sense, heritage has a valid role to play in helping us to understand long term social and environmental change. It also contributes largely to the construction of identity at different scales. Rather than viewing heritage as a simple property that has been preserved for a long time, we should instead focus on how a value-laden interpretation of the past is being bequeathed and in what way it is rendered useful in the present.

 

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