About the project
In this project we explore understandings and manifestations of natural heritage, as well as the complicated relationship between natural and cultural heritage in light of climate change.
Anchored in archaeology and critical heritage studies, and drawing on environmental humanities more broadly, Relics of Nature is a reaction to the challenges of climate change. At the same time, the project also questions an image of nature that dominates many environmental and heritage discourses: one that depicts nature as pure, authentic and “out there”.
Working through case studies in the high north including Iceland and Svalbard, and combining fieldwork and discourse analysis, the project asks: what becomes of natural heritage in a changing world? How can we react constructively to processes of change and loss? And, what does the mostly taken-for-granted term of “sustainability” really imply in contexts of nature-cultures and environmental change?
Visit the project website (relicsofnature.com).
Objectives
The project‘s primary objectives are threefold:
- It will scrutinize the cultural and ontological values involved in a) understandings of natural heritage and b) discriminations between natural and cultural heritage
- It will investigate how such scrutinizing can inform alternative understandings of sustainability and environmental ethics in the Anthropocene
- It will employ the project’s findings in public outreach, and explore how natural heritage may become a more inclusive venue for critical environmental dialogue
Through its ambitions Relics of Nature will also aim to:
- further the place of natural heritage within the field of critical heritage studies
- strengthening the voice of the humanities in urgent environmental research and discourse
Cooperation
The project cooperates with the research group Materialities at IAKH, the research network of HEI: Heritage Experience Initiative at UiO, and the research project Unruly Heritage at UiT - The Arctic University of Norway.
Financing
The Research Council of Norway, contract nr. 314607.
Duration
1 August 2021 - 31 July 2025.