Home » Events » International LDE-Heritage conference | 26-28 November 2019 | TU Delft, The Netherlands

International LDE-Heritage conference | 26-28 November 2019 | TU Delft, The Netherlands

Heritage – natural and cultural, material and immaterial – plays a key role in the development of sustainable cities and communities. Goal 11, target 4, of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), emphasizes the relation between heritage and sustainability. The conference inquires into the theories, methodologies, and practices of heritage and SDG. It asks: How is heritage produced and defined? By who and in what contexts? What are the understandings of sustainability, and how are these situational and contextual? How can theoretical findings on heritage and SDGs engage with heritage practice?

The conference builds upon the multidisciplinary expertise of academics in the humanities, social sciences and spatial sciences, notably the interdisciplinary cross-over research program Design & History@TUDelft, the active collaboration in the Heritage and Identity section of the LDE-Center for Global Heritage and Development (CGHD), heritage-related research conducted at Leiden University, as well as by other associated partners in the consortium.

The Design & History@TUDelft research program brings together different departments and disciplines: architecture, urbanism, history, landscape architecture, real estate, and management and engineering. Design & History@TUDelft aims to further understanding of the role of history and heritage in the transformation of cities, and consequently using the past to enable buildings, cities, and landscapes to develop more sustainable, resource-efficient, resilient, safe and inclusive. Researchers from Leiden University approach heritage from a broad variety of disciplinary perspectives, such as archaeology, museum studies, cultural anthropology, and area studies. Leiden heritage research explores processes of heritage making, and the appreciation and valuation of material and immaterial heritage, to arrive at new insights towards the cultural constitution of societies. Creating, acknowledging and contesting heritage tends to be politically sensitive, as it involves assertions and redefinitions of memory and identity.

This conference creates a setting for academics and heritage-practitioners to explore these questions from distinct angles. We aim to bring academics and practitioners into the conversation to further their understanding of and impact on heritage conservation, and to increase their impact on the sustainable development of cities and communities. For the conference schedule, click here.

Prof. Amareswar Galla is a keynote speaker at the conference.