In this article we examine the way local, national, and regional politics affect the policies and practices of “intangible cultural heritage” (ICH)—a notion derived from the 2003 UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage—in two detailed case studies from the Republic of Macedonia. While our conclusions are particular to our case studies, we hope that researchers in other national settings will find them useful for describing and analysing their own situations. We begin with a discussion of heritagization and recontextualization, which are inherent in ICH safeguarding processes. Next, we provide background on the external contestation of a distinct Macedonian ethnic and national identity, and the ways that UNESCO ICH safeguarding processes have been perceived and applied in Macedonia. Against that backdrop, we then describe and analyse two contrasting cases of ICH—the social dance “Kopackata” and the Galicnik Wedding—both of which illustrate how the cultural heritage concept itself can sometimes be used for national, commercial, and political ends.

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Macedonian folk songs, as a part of Macedonian traditions and culture, represent an integral part of Macedonian history marked by resistance, military feats, and tendencies for maintaining the Macedonian national identity. This paper is focused on the issue of whether two Macedonian folk songs With Torments I was Born and Listen Patriots created in the course of the 19 th century-a period marked with active struggle for liberation and independence of the Macedonian nation-additionally intensify the emotions provoked by the storyline and action of the films, in which they have been incorporated. During the research process, the authors of the paper used the mechanism of cognitive appraisal as a model for content analysis, as well as psychological and ethnomusicological analysis of the resulting data. The units of content analysis were the sequences of scenes of the film, in which the two Macedonian folk songs were used. The selected songs and films, as well as the interaction between the sound and visual senses, clearly present the deep relationship between music and emotions in a specific, identity-related context. The findings of the study are in favor of the thesis that Macedonian folk songs, created as a result of the centuries-old struggle of the Macedonian people, when used in Macedonian films, intensify the patriotic emotions of the viewers and strengthen the concept of uniqueness in the Macedonian identity, due to the processes of repetition and revitalization of collective memories.

They say that there is a purpose behind meeting anyone in your life. My meeting with Svanibor Pettan in August 1999 resulted in gaining a lifelong friend, a colleague and an advisor who always had positive influence not just on my personal and professional development, but more wider, on the establishment of the currently most important regional scholarly network of traditional music and dance in Southeastern Europe.