Table Of ContentRe-imagining HeRitage
inteRpRetation
For my parents
Re-imagining Heritage
interpretation
enchanting the past-Future
Russell staiFF
University of Western Sydney, Australia
© Russell staiff 2014
all rights reserved. no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher.
Russell staiff has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and patents act, 1988, to
be identified as the author of this work.
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:
staiff, Russell.
Re-imagining heritage interpretation : enchanting the past-future / by Russell staiff.
pages cm.
includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4094-5550-9 (hardback)—ISBN 978-1-4094-5551-6 (ebook)—ISBN 978-
1-4724-0735-1 (epub) 1. Interpretation of cultural and natural resources. 2. Cultural
property—Philosophy. 3. Heritage tourism. I. Title.
gV181.18.s83 2013
363.6’9—dc23
2013020847
ISBN 9781409455509 (hbk)
ISBN 9781409455516 (ebk – PDF)
ISBN 9781472407351 (ebk – ePUB)
III
Contents
Acknowledgements vii
Prologue: the known, the unknown and other ruminations 1
1 Anecdotes and observations 7
2 Tilden: beyond resurrection 29
3 The somatic and the aesthetic: embodied heritage experiences 43
4 Visual cultures: imagining and knowing through looking 71
5 Narratives and narrativity: the story is the thing 95
6 Digital media and social networking 117
7 Conversing across cultures 137
8 Enchantment, wonder and other raptures: imaginings outside
didacticism 159
References 175
Index 187
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Acknowledgements
This book had its origins a long time ago. I was with a group of students in Budaroo
National Park, south of Sydney, and for the first time I heard the word ‘interpretation’
in a way that struck me as distinctly odd. ‘The interpretation is getting tired’ we
were told by the park manager. As an art historian who had very recently moved
sideways into heritage and tourism studies, the use of the term ‘interpretation’ in
such a precise context and with such a particular meaning was strange to me. ‘Isn’t
everything about interpretation? What else is there?’ I asked myself.
Fifteen years later this book is an attempt to answer these questions. First and
foremost, I want to thank a number of people and institutions that have been crucial
to the project. I owe a considerable debt to the University of Western Sydney
for granting me sabbatical leave in 2009-2010. The Faculty of Architecture at
Silpakorn University in Bangkok (within their Architectural Heritage Management
and Tourism international programme) hosted me during this period and both
institutions have my sincere gratitude for providing such stimulating environments.
The first four chapters of the book were drafted during this sabbatical.
I want to sincerely thank my heritage colleagues in the School of Social Science
and Psychology and in the Institute of Culture and Society within the University of
Western Sydney, particularly Robyn Bushell, Tim Winter, Emma Waterton, John
Giblin and Fiona Cameron. They have, in various ways, provided the critical fire
within which the book was forged. I’d also like to thank my colleagues (past and
present) in the heritage and tourism studies unit who have been lively companions
along the trek: Corazon Sinha, John Streckfuss, Ian Knowd, Julie Wen, Poll
Theerapappisit, Wendy Holland and Amie Matthews.
A special acknowledgement goes to the many PhD students I have had the
pleasure to mentor at the University of Western Sydney and Silpakorn University.
It has been a rich engagement with a number of the themes in the book over many
years. To my parents who, for varying short periods of time, provided me with a
place of tranquility well away from the hustle and bustle of Sydney, I offer heart-
felt thanks. To Kym and Nikki I give thanks for memorable travel, conversations
and accommodation in a most beautiful and exhilarating heritage setting. I offer
particular thanks to the folk at Ashgate who have been nothing less than supportive
and encouraging.
And, finally, I owe a great debt to the legion of undergraduate students whom
I’ve had the privilege to teach over many years. They were the inspiration for and
the raison d’être of the book.
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Prologue: the known, the unknown
and other ruminations
Those who do not expect the unexpected will not find it, for it is trackless and
unexplored.
These words appear in a surviving fragment of the writings of the philosopher
Heraclitus who lived in the ancient Greek city of Ephesus between c.535 and 475 bce
(Kahn 1979: 105). If any aphorism were to somehow capture my expectations of
visiting a heritage site, it would perhaps be this one: to expect the unexpected. But
Heraclitus suggests something more than this: that the unexpected is not a mapped
entity; it is not found along a pre-determined path; it resides in that which has yet
to be known.
Of course, heritage sites are, almost by definition, anything but unexplored
places having been subjected to critical surveillance in minute detail. They have
been measured against all sorts of criteria. They have endured countless physical
interventions in the attempts, often heroic, to preserve, restore and conserve them for
the present/future. They have become the subject of a multitude of representations
– maps, guidebooks, management documents, conservation plans, drawings,
photographs, videos, films, scholarly treatises, in art works, tourism promotional
material and interpretation in all its forms (see Waterton and Watson 2010).
This dualism between what I expect (a place of discovery, of imaginative
engagement, of speculation, of confrontation, of being confounded, of exploring
the unknown, of emotional entanglement, of a place where I may tussle with the
self, where I might dare to court with danger or bliss or controversy or sensuality, of
being there – with all its embodied implications) and the often much more prosaic
encounter with something that feels as though it has preceded me, something that
is already over-determined by the discourses that circulate through a heritage site
(and beyond) is, admittedly, a personal conundrum. However, I have never been
able to fully ignore this intensity, as I wildly oscillate between entering a heritage
place that is already in some way known to me (for whatever reason) and the desire
to explore afresh (even when I’m aware of how this desire has been constructed
and/or manipulated).
This enduring tension, to a degree, animates the journey of this book. I love to
visit a place I know almost intimately because of the deep knowledge, memories,
feelings and associations that I carry around with me. But, equally, I love to visit
those places that are unknown, where the elements of excitement and surprise are
still possible. However, the more rational part of me knows that these two things
are hinged. I can find wonder, awe, surprise, loss, joy, foreboding, imagining, anger
