The intangible heritage:
The intangible heritage might be defined as embracing all forms of
traditional and popular or folk culture, i.e. collective works originating
in a given community and based on tradition. These creations are transmitted
orally or by gesture, and are modified over a period of time through a
process of collective recreation. They include oral traditions, customs,
languages, music, dance, rituals, festivities, traditional medicine and
pharmacopoeia, the culinary arts and all kinds of special skills connected
with the material aspects of culture, such as tools and the habitat.
What for, and for whom?
For many Iraqis the intangible heritage is the vital source of their
identity that is deeply rooted in history. The philosophy, values, moral
code and ways of thinking transmitted by oral traditions, languages and the
various forms taken by its culture constitute the foundation of a
community’s life. The essentially ephemeral nature of this intangible
heritage makes it highly vulnerable. It is urgent to take action!
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The intangible heritage is vast in extent and concerns each individual,
for everyone bears within him the heritage of his own community. The
safeguarding of that heritage must be triggered by individual initiative and
backed up by associations, by specialists and by institutions; only then
will the national authorities take it into account.
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It is not easy to map out the boundaries of what is called the cultural
heritage of humanity. The intangible heritage imbues every aspect of an
individual’s life and informs all products of the cultural heritage -
artifacts, monuments, sites and landscapes.
