Safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage – the spirit and the letter of the law

The 2003 UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage has been discussed, characterised and criticised for its terms and ideas and for the problems that it is claimed to raise in many ways (Berkaak 2010, Ivey 2004, Kirschenblatt-Gimblet 2004, Keitumetse 2006, Kurin 2004b  Grau 2009). More than a decade has now passed since 2003. The Convention can be seen in the light of how it has functioned so far. Safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage has been an explicit part of the author’s work description at the Foundation for Traditional Music and Dance1 since 1973. He has been member of UNESCO’s evaluating bodies for several years, and has an agenda and opinions to promote on behalf of those for whom and with whom he has worked. For this reason, the article is not meant to be a description of the Convention, nor a distanced, theoretical discussion about broad concepts such as heritage. It is meant to be an article engaging with the interpretations and development of the Convention. It will promote certain points of view and will have a polemic edge. The argumentation seeks to find its support in a close reading of the Convention text itself, in the broad material produced for the implementation of the Convention (i.e. UNESCO 2014a), and in the summary of experiences and recommendations from the evaluation work. (UNESCO 2014b

Multi-Track Practises and Linearisation

This article discusses aspects of the epistemology of practice. It defines the term practice to mean bodily actions, that usually have names and are considered as repeated or reoccurring in society and often based upon advanced skills. Examples could be ice skating, playing a fiddle tune, braiding hair, making a vegetable soup or dancing the waltz. The article addresses the methodology in the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage at one narrow, specific and concrete point; a mechanism I call linearisation. I oppose this to practices that are not regulated into an authorised form but often has many alternatives in its structure; points where the practitioner can choose between several options. I call this a multi-track practice. What I discuss is how the multi-track practices tend to be linearised into one line of elements in a fixed order

12. The Ban on Round Dances 1917–1957: Regulating Social Dancing in Norwegian Community Houses

This chapter aims to contextualise the forty-year ban which the Norwegian Liberal Youth Movement placed on round dances during meetings in the period 1917–1957. I hope to feed into the discussion on the resistance these dances met throughout Europe. The chapter portrays the three largest popular movements in Norway, which were the main agents in relation to popular dance, because they controlled most of the community houses in the country. Since such houses were very much sought after for dan..

4. The Waltz at Some Central European Courts

As discussed above (see Chapters 1 and 2), many of the books written about round dances circle around the outcries that these dances are morally unacceptable because of the tight embrace of, and closeness to, the opposite sex. The arguments include the view that the dances make women defenceless, that they are open to abuse, and that they are harmful to women’s health. On the other hand, there are reports about dance crazes, endless enthusiasm, and, finally, in the later stages, nostalgic pra..

2. The State of Research

A comprehensive body of literature deals fully or partly with round dances, and particularly with the Waltz. There are works that deal with the form and structure of the dances based on first-hand knowledge, such as manuals from dancing masters. Many surveys describe the history of round dances, often as part of broader projects. These are often built upon the compilation and study of scattered excerpts from a large variety of historical documents, such as diaries, letters, memoirs, newspaper..

3. A Survey of the Chapters in the Book

Most of this book is comprised of case studies from European countries that, during the late eighteenth and the first half of the nineteenth centuries, were not the independent states they are today. They were more or less clearly defined provinces or parts of empires or kingdoms. Dance histories have, to a large extent, been written on the basis of material from the large, prestigious centres of Europe, written in the dominant languages. The contributions in this book present sources from a ..