Heritage as future-making: aspiration and common destiny in Sierra Leone

Zetterstrom-Sharp, Johanna T. 2015. Heritage as future-making: aspiration and common destiny in Sierra Leone. International Journal of Heritage Studies, 21(6), pp. 609-627. ISSN 1352-7258 [Article]

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Abstract or Description

This paper engages with an arising interest in heritage as a ‘future-making’ project, arguing that in a context such as Sierra Leone heritage work may be better understood as a reflection of aspirations for a ‘common destiny’, than the articulation of common pasts. It questions the centrality with which modern anxiety continues to frame heritage temporalities, drawing on anthropological engagements with contexts of development and social transformation to propose a non-linear model for mapping the relationship between the past and the present. Drawing on a recent surge in heritage work in Sierra Leone, I suggest that heritage has efficacy beyond the provision of emotional security in a context of rapid change, indeed that it may be implicated in the process of instituting and shaping change itself.

Item Type:

Article

Identification Number (DOI):

https://doi.org/10.1080/13527258.2014.973060

Additional Information:

This research was supported by an AHRC PhD Studentship as part of the Beyond Text program from 2009 to 2012, a generous AHRC contribution to fieldwork in 2010, and receipt of a UCL Institute of Archaeology Chair’s Action Award in 2014.

Keywords:

This paper engages with an arising interest in heritage as a ‘future-making’ project, arguing that in a context such as Sierra Leone heritage work may be better understood as a reflection of aspirations for a ‘common destiny’, than the articulation of common pasts. It questions the centrality with which modern anxiety continues to frame heritage temporalities, drawing on anthropological engagements with contexts of development and social transformation to propose a non-linear model for mapping the relationship between the past and the present. Drawing on a recent surge in heritage work in Sierra Leone, I suggest that heritage has efficacy beyond the provision of emotional security in a context of rapid change, indeed that it may be implicated in the process of instituting and shaping change itself.

Departments, Centres and Research Units:

Anthropology

Dates:

DateEvent
27 September 2014Accepted
23 October 2014Published Online
2015Published

Item ID:

27346

Date Deposited:

30 Oct 2019 16:28

Last Modified:

30 Oct 2019 16:28

Peer Reviewed:

Yes, this version has been peer-reviewed.

URI:

https://research.gold.ac.uk/id/eprint/27346

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