Although I’ve only been in Brazil for about two months, and am careful about over-generalizing based on my limited experience, it seems as if phenomenology, as a field of study, is much more active here than in the United States. In the US, phenomenology gained traction in the 1970s in the humanistic geography field, represented […]
Month: September 2015
Community workshop meetings in Olinda
Work is proceeding on setting up the first of what will hopefully be a series of community workshop meetings in Olinda that will address what should become of the Horto d’El Rey. I’ve written about this garden previously, as well as what I hope my research will accomplish and how the overall community engagement and […]
UFPE mini-course: old places, significance, and a social science approach
This week I gave my first series of lectures in a special “mini course” at the Department of Urban Development (MDU) at the Federal University of Pernambuco (UFPE). The first two topics I addressed were “Why Do Old Places Matter? What the Social Sciences Can Tell Us” and “Principles for Integrating Social Science Research Methods […]
Shards of the Past: Remembrance & Foreshadowing by Jack D. Elliott, Jr.
Last year, Kent State University published a book on Historic Preservation and Urban Change (Terry Schwarz, editor). In it was a paper by a familiar author: Jack D. Elliott, Jr. Elliott had a profound effect on my doctoral research when I came across his 2002 article on “radical preservation” in the National Trust for Historic […]
Call for papers: Critical Heritage and Tourism
I ran across this session proposal as part of the Society for Applied Anthropology’s 76th Annual Meeting in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada , March 29–April 2, 2016. Normally, I’m only inclined to post calls here that intersect with practice, heritage studies, and the social sciences. This call seemed to lack an applied orientation until I […]
Call for abstracts: Rights-Based Approaches to Heritage Management: Possibilities and Limitations
[The following call for abstracts was received via e-mail from the organizer] Rights-Based Approaches to Heritage Management: Possibilities and Limitations Panel session proposal for the Association of Critical Heritage Studies Conference, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, 6-10th June 2016 Organizer: Bahar Aykan, Ph.D., Department of Sociology, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Marmara University, Istanbul, Turkey; aykanbahar@gmail.com Email […]
Mini course at UFPE on the social sciences and heritage conservation
While I’m working on my research in Olinda, Brazil, I will be participating in a “mini course” in the Urban Development Program (MDU) at the Federal University of Pernambuco (UFPE). In this course, I’ll be lecturing on a number of topics that address critical heritage studies theory, the use of social science research methods in […]
Bringing phenomenology to the people (but don’t call it that)
The phenomenological approach is of particular relevance when dealing with the questions of significance for preservation. … If a historical place is such a phenomenon, then the term ‘significant’ should be used in preservation to describe places whose physical character and matrices of historical, mythical, and social associations can and do evoke experiences of […]
The conservation of the historic environment: the void dweller
In the early 1990s, when I was following the techno music scene closely, I came across a track called “Spice” by EON, which I really liked. (It borrowed sound bites, quite liberally, from the movie Dune. I can still hear the phrase, “the spice must flow” in my head.) So how does this relate to […]
Call for abstracts: Using Applied Social Science Methodologies to Conserve the Historic Environment: Can Evidence Change Practice?
Environmental Design Research Association (EDRA) intensive proposal for the EDRA47 conference on May 18, 2016 at the Raleigh Convention Center, Raleigh, North Carolina, USA Submission deadline has been extended to Wednesday, September 30 Organizers Dr. Jeremy Wells, Assistant Professor of Historic Preservation, Roger Williams University; Co-chair of the EDRA Historic Environment Knowledge Network; jwells@rwu.edu Dr. […]