VIRTUAL ISTANBUL HERITAGE(S)
Abstract
As the international arbiter of culture, UNESCO privileges certain practices and discounts others through its restrictive definition of intangible cultural heritage (ICH). UNESCO’s ICH is rooted in a localized community, transmitted across generations, largely transmitted orally, and reinforces community identities. Excluded are cultural activities that are translocal, experimental, improvisational, self-consciously hybrid, transmitted through electronic media, and that forge and sustain broader, inclusive identities. Caribbean theorists such as Édouard Glissant and Stuart Hall challenge us to attend to creolization as a cultural process. Not simply additive, creolization creates something new and sustains inclusive identities. While half of Belizeans speak Belizean Kriol and 80% identify as of mixed ancestry, Belize’s National Institute of Culture and History essentially follows the UNESCO model by focusing on preserving the cultural heritage of distinctive ethnic groups (its “rich tapestry”). Cultural activities that are improvisational and that broaden notions of community do not receive the same official support. On any given weekend night, however, young people gather in dance clubs, which feature musical and dance genres that are self-consciously hybrid, experimental, playful, and translocal, including punta rock, soca, dancehall, reggaetón, and brukdown. The dance club as a generative locus for creolization deserves greater attention. While UNESCO fears the corrosive power of globalization, as Belizeans of diverse ethnic backgrounds gather in nightclubs to dance, play, and chat in Kriol, they participate in processes of creolization that fortify local communities and a respect for cultural diversity, just as much as do the types of heritage privileged by UNESCO.
A political anthropologist, Christine Kray’s research has focused on the Yucatec Maya of Belize and Mexico, and she uses ethnographic, oral historical, and archival methods to critically examine colonialism, war, religion, and evangelization. The author and editor of three books, she is currently examining the dynamics of alliance, competition, and conflict among Maya residents, British mahogany companies, and the British Honduran colonial government in the early 20th century.