Call for Application: Industrial Heritage as a Source of Social Empowerment and Economic Revitalization
Postgraduate summer course at Central European University (CEU) in Budapest, Hungary, 6 July - 15 July, 2020
The course will focus on the potential of industrial heritage to be a transformative influence in the post-industrial regions. It aims to bridge an industrial past, through a deindustrialized present, towards an economically and socially sustainable future. It is based on the recognition that there is a gap between heritage specialist focusing on heritage assets on one side, and policymakers and developers focusing on social and economic development on the other. The way to bridge this gap is using heritage as a resource for development, which, at the same time, secures the sustainability of heritage. Heritage is considered as a lever of economic growth and social renewal in post-industrial landscapes.
The course will look at tangible and intangible heritage – landscape, built heritage, mobile heritage, practices, knowledge, social structures – linked to redundant industrial landscapes. It will address the question of how cultural heritage can change the cultural identity of a region promoting an optimistic future. The course aims to improve the participants` ability to understand industrial heritage within the dynamic relationship of three levels: the macro-level of regions (spatial planning and territorial development), the meso-level of settlements (urban planning), and the micro-level of buildings. Adaptive reuse of buildings and complexes will be a special focus.
The course will look at the regeneration not only of individual buildings but also of entire regions. Heritage studies will be combined with discussions of visionary leadership to consider how the disadvantages of a redundant region (such as mass-unemployment) can be re-positioned as benefits (such as an available skilled workforce). The re-development and management of former industrial sites is a complex process requiring multiple skills and fields of expertise. This is why the course involves a multidisciplinary faculty body, including researchers in various areas, policy experts, spatial planners, managers as well as cultural actors and artists.
First application deadline: February 14, 2020.
See more: https://summeruniversity.ceu.edu/industrial-heritage-2020