Marie Louise Stig Sørensen – författare

This is the first volume specifically dedicated to the consolidation and clarification of Heritage Studies as a distinct field with its own means of investigation. It presents the range of methods that can be used and illustrates their application through case studies from different parts of the world, including the UK and USA. The challenge that the collection makes explicit is that Heritage Studies must develop a stronger recognition of the scope and nature of its data and a concise yet explorative understanding of its analytical methods. The methods considered fall within three broad categories: textual/discourse analysis, methods for investigating people’s attitudes and behaviour; and methods for exploring the material qualities of heritage. The methods discussed and illustrated range from techniques such as text analysis, interviews, participant observation, to semiotic analysis of heritage sites and the use of GIS. Each paper discusses the ways in which methods used in social analysis generally are explored and adapted to the specific demands that arise when applied to the investigation of heritage in its many forms. Heritage Studies is a seminal volume that will help to define the field. The global perspective and the shared focus upon the development of reflexive methodologies ensure that the volume explores these central issues in a manner that is simultaneously case-specific and of general relevance.

This is the first volume specifically dedicated to the consolidation and clarification of Heritage Studies as a distinct field with its own means of investigation. It presents the range of methods that can be used and illustrates their application through case studies from different parts of the world, including the UK and USA. The challenge that the collection makes explicit is that Heritage Studies must develop a stronger recognition of the scope and nature of its data and a concise yet explorative understanding of its analytical methods. The methods considered fall within three broad categories: textual/discourse analysis, methods for investigating people’s attitudes and behaviour; and methods for exploring the material qualities of heritage. The methods discussed and illustrated range from techniques such as text analysis, interviews, participant observation, to semiotic analysis of heritage sites and the use of GIS. Each paper discusses the ways in which methods used in social analysis generally are explored and adapted to the specific demands that arise when applied to the investigation of heritage in its many forms. Heritage Studies is a seminal volume that will help to define the field. The global perspective and the shared focus upon the development of reflexive methodologies ensure that the volume explores these central issues in a manner that is simultaneously case-specific and of general relevance.

This major new textbook explores the relations between gender and archaeology, providing an innovative and important account of how material culture is used in the construction of gender. Throughout this lively and accessible text, Sorensen engages with the question of how gender is materially constituted, and examines the intersection of social and material concerns from the Palaeolithic Age to the present day. Part One discusses a range of important general issues, beginning with an overview of the recent role of gender and gender relations in our appropriation of past societies. After introducing the debate about feminist or gender archaeology, Sorensen examines archaeology's concern with the sex/gender distinction, the nature of negotiation, and feminist epistemological claims in relation to archaeology. In Part Two, the author focuses on the materiality of gender, exploring it through case studies ranging from prehistory to contemporary society. Food, dress, space and contact are examined in turn, to show how they express and negotiate gender roles.This illustrated textbook will be essential reading for students and scholars in archaeology, anthropology, material culture studies and women's studies.

Through case studies from Europe and Russia, this volume analyses memorials as a means for the present to make claims on the past in the aftermath of armed conflict. The central contention is that memorials are not backward-looking, inert reminders of past events, but instead active triggers of personal and shared emotion, that are inescapably political, bound up with how societies reconstruct their present and future as they negotiate their way out of (and sometimes back into) conflict. A central aim of the book is to highlight and illustrate the cultural and ethical complexity of memorials, as focal points for a tension between the notion of memory as truth, and the practice of memory as negotiable. By adopting a relatively bounded temporal and spatial scope, the volume seeks to move beyond the established focus on national traditions, to reveal cultural commonalities and shared influences in the memorial forms and practices of individual regions and of particular conflicts.

Through case studies from Europe and Russia, this volume analyses memorials as a means for the present to make claims on the past in the aftermath of armed conflict. The central contention is that memorials are not backward-looking, inert reminders of past events, but instead active triggers of personal and shared emotion, that are inescapably political, bound up with how societies reconstruct their present and future as they negotiate their way out of (and sometimes back into) conflict. A central aim of the book is to highlight and illustrate the cultural and ethical complexity of memorials, as focal points for a tension between the notion of memory as truth, and the practice of memory as negotiable. By adopting a relatively bounded temporal and spatial scope, the volume seeks to move beyond the established focus on national traditions, to reveal cultural commonalities and shared influences in the memorial forms and practices of individual regions and of particular conflicts.

The richness of Africa’s heritage at times stands in stark contrast to the economic, health, political and societal challenges faced. Development is essential but in what forms? For whom? Following whose agendas? At what costs? This book explores how heritage can promote, secure, or undermine sustainable development with special focus on sub-Saharan Africa, and in turn, how this affects conceptions of heritage. The chapters in this volume  identify shared challenges, good practices and failures, and use specific case studies to provide detailed insights into varied forms of heritage and heritage defining processes on the continent. By critically analysing the often romanticised discourses of ‘heritage’, ‘community engagement’, and ‘sustainable development’ the volume suggests ways of harnessing aspects of heritage to tackle some of the socio-economic and political pressures facing heritage practices on the continent, including the legacies of colonialism.