di Fabiola Mancinelli
Ti scrivo per esprimerti, sostanzialmente, my disagreement on this job. A disagreement that arises, of course, from a consideration of Rites as unfit to resume the formal idea of \u200b\u200bintangible heritage by UNESCO. Quite the contrary. I know that, in many ways, they fit perfectly in that definition. However, I wonder and I ask: what would be the target of such, if any, recognition?
One thing I think is important in this process, and is definitely an effort to formalize the tradition, to fix it in the documents, to save time and oblivion. In an article published in your ViviTelese you rightly ask: How 'urban context' future penitential rites will be held in seven, fourteen, twenty years? As can be passed on from generation to generation? As you can constantly recreate in close correlation with the surrounding environment and its history? However, I believe that these words will be doing a two for me they are two separate issues - one concerning the deterioration of the historic center and the other the transmission of knowledge concerning the rites - and that puts you in the first more urgent than others. I remain skeptical that, even to save the historic center, "the only viable solution is the inclusion in the UNESCO list of Rites."
The Old Town is definitely one of the rites, but it is still more strongly Guardiese identity, beyond the appointment of seven. It is certainly not closing the center that affects the spirit of the rites, as those streets are stone scenery, beautiful, precious, but not related directly to "the practices, representations, expressions, knowledge, and knowledge - as well as instruments, objects, artefacts and cultural spaces associated with them. " Sure, see that Gates has caused grief, indignation, rage. But it also gives to see those secret passages ('rc'rill) opened on a trip to Naples on Sunday for lack of alternatives. As for them, the rituals have not undergone upheavals, certainly brought under the eyes of all the state of abandonment that has reduced our country.
I have a modest knowledge of mechanisms of UNESCO, on the grounds that star doing a Ph.D. thesis on a culture whose craftsmanship has been recently declared a World Heritage Intangible (Zafimaniry-Madagascar) and for being emotionally tied to a party in Catalonia, Patum of the Berga, also returned in the list since 2005.
These small but significant experience in two different contexts, but where I found the same side effects - in the first desired, since a poor country, sin can not say the same of the second-I have matured a belief that we want to clarify, this is before consideration of our rituals: the inclusion in UNESCO's just a big advertising operation. Of prestige, of course, but pure marketing. The statement serves only to getting more people. What, yes, you could get us all the work of collecting and cataloging information, preparation of the application form which is a good time to reflect on their identity. Provided that is done as a community initiative.
On the other hand, I do not think you could UNESCO wait a support for the rehabilitation of the historic center. The inclusion in the list of UNESCO, in fact, as far as I know, does not provide funding to hoc, even though it includes some activities for the preservation of specific aspects of knowledge covered by the declaration. Perhaps the attention that would result could be an incentive to "run for cover" by our various governments (municipal, provincial, regional) ... but it seems to me that the issue is at stake for many years and nobody has been able to forward serious proposals for the recovery of our architectural heritage. Until you get to a point that seems of no return. Nevertheless, I repeat, I think the question of the old town has little to do with the rituals, because there are ritual elements (if not the church and its square) directly connected with the space where the processions are held.
