CHILE: Grassroots Heritage Preservation Efforts Growing

  •  santiago
  • Inter Press Service

With the first National Congress on Heritage Neighbourhoods and Areas, community groups in Chile plan to draw attention to their struggle to defend the country's vulnerable historic heritage.

'This initiative has emerged from the citizens, for the citizens, and it has the aim of strengthening and empowering the different community organisations that throughout Chile are working to defend and develop our cultural heritage,' Rosario Carvajal, president of the Our Heritage Foundation, told IPS:

The three-day congress kicks off Thursday with the 'Fiesta del Roto Chileno', one of the most important traditional street festivals in Chile, with typical dancing and singing as well as photography exhibits, literature readings and films, in the neighbourhood of Yungay in Santiago.

On Friday and Saturday, 90 lectures and presentations will be given on local and international initiatives to protect cultural heritage, in the Gabriela Mistral Museum of Education, the Santiago Library and the Museum of Contemporary Art.

Participants from La Paz, Bolivia; Quito, Ecuador; Lima, Peru; and Córdoba and Buenos Aires in Argentina will take part. For example, Ángel Ybarhuen, mayor of Cotahuasi in the southwestern Peruvian region of Arequipa, will give a speech on the defence and development of the heritage of that Andean district, while José Baca from Ecuador will give a presentation on workshop schools in Quito.

Lawmaker Felipe Harboe of the Chilean opposition Party for Democracy (PPD) will discuss the successes of and challenges faced by the Special Historical and Cultural Heritage Commission of the lower house of Congress. The Our Heritage Foundation was created in 2008 as part of a grassroots effort to preserve the Yungay neighbourhood, which two years ago was declared a National Historic District (Zona Típica) of Chile.

'During that effort, we realised we were not the only group that was concerned about the issue, and we began creating a network,' she said. In 2009, they set up the Chilean Association of Heritage Neighbourhoods and Areas, which is also headed by Carvajal and has organised seminars and gatherings around the country. The Association is now holding the first National Congress, which will promote a 'Citizen's Heritage Agenda'. 'Our greatest threat is the institutional vulnerability that exists today in the area of cultural and historical heritage,' said Carvajal.

© Inter Press Service (2011) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service