Join Dr. Trinidad Rico on her talk about Global Heritage, Religion, and Secularism

Abstract

Religion and spirituality have been scarcely addressed in heritage preservation history, discourse, and practice. More recently, increased interest in the intersections between the study of religion and heritage preservation in both academic studies and institutional initiatives highlight obstacles that the field has yet to overcome theoretically and methodologically. This talk surveys the convergences of religious and heritage traditions. It argues that the critical heritage turn has not adequately considered the legacy of secularism that underpins the history and contemporary practices of heritage preservation. This omission has left the field of heritage studies ill-equipped to support the study and management of a heritage of religion broadly construed. 

Bio

Trinidad Rico is Associate Professor and Director of Cultural Heritage and Preservation Studies at Rutgers University, with associate appointments in Anthropology, History, Geography, Landscape Architecture and the School of Planning and Public Policy. She is also Honorary Associate Professor at the Institute of Archaeology of University College London, and Vice President of the Association of Critical Heritage Studies. She is author of Constructing Destruction: Heritage Narratives in the Tsunami City; editor of The Making of Islamic Heritage: Muslim Pasts and Heritage Presents, and co-editor of Heritage Keywords: Rhetoric and Redescription in Cultural Heritage and co-editor of Cultural Heritage in the Arabian Peninsula: Debates, Discourses and Practices. 

The UMD Heritage Lectures are supported by the Department of Anthropology and the School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation.

 To access the Zoom link, please RSVP: ter.ps/trinidadrico