Emeka E Okonkwo

Case Studies in Heritage Management Emeka E Okonkwo

The past three decades have seen rapid growth in studies on heritage management and the need to integrate local or cultural knowledge into modern management processes, sometimes referred to as historic preservation, in which emphasis is placed on the preservation of historic documents, archival resources and monuments or cultural resource management, which focuses on tangible and intangible cultural products, past and present or natural resource management, that emphasizes flora and fauna. Heritage management refers to any process and/or institutional provisions that attempt to preserve and/or conserve natural and cultural resources (tangible and intangible) handed down through generations, which ultimately ensure their continued survival. These include, but not limited to sanctions, taboos, laws and restrictions, local conservation practices, palaces, museums, archives etc. instituted to ensure, individually or collectively, the sustenance of sacred sites, forests, water bodies, shrines, monuments, valuable cultural assets and other areas of historic significance. Thus, heritage management can be seen as the meeting point between natural resource management and cultural resource management. Currently, the products of these sites constitute valuable educational source materials for scholars in cultural studies and related areas, and veritable laboratories for those in biological sciences. The overall goal of this volume is to explore trends in heritage management as portrayed by professional heritage managers and the academia. The essential issues raised bother on how to promote an understanding of the resources and showcase their historic essence, on one hand, and how to harness them for the development of the society and the wellbeing of the people, on another. Case study reports were drawn from diverse backgrounds, but with emphasis on Africa, to portray the heritage management practices, the new dimensions in heritage management, and the implication of foreign incursions. The papers were arranged thematically to ensure easy understanding of the arguments and issues raised by individual contributors, with papers of wider focus taking precedence. The approach will hopefully promote an understanding, from African perspective, of the various issues that challenge heritage management, the efforts made so far to address them, and the way forward. This will ultimately lead to a proper conceptualization of the values of local knowledge in heritage conservation.