Defining “Official” Built Heritage Discourses within the Irish Planning Framework: Insights from Conservation Planning as Social Practice

Transforming the museum and meeting visitor requirements: The case of the Shaanxi History Museum

“…Thus, a key question for all museums today when using such technologies is the issue of deciding what information and context is to be provided. This implies that we need to add a third theme to the narratives identified by Parkinson et al (2015) , Simon (2010) and others. This represents an enhancement of both the ‘museum-curatorial’ and the more ‘inclusive’ which one might name the narrative of ‘story-telling.’ Story telling has long been a resource of Museums specifically ( Bedford, 2001 ; Wyman, Smith, Meyers, & Godfrey, 2011 ) and tourism in general ( Bassano et al, 2019 ), but the introduction of technologies better direct the gaze of the visitor/tourist, and may leave unchallenged the intent behind the story-telling.…”

“… Parkinson, Scott, and Redmond (2015) comment with reference to Irish plans for built heritage that heritage broadly refers to conservation, protection and attraction. They also state a tension exists between two narratives – that of ‘museum-curatorial’ on the one hand and the ‘inclusive heritage’ discourse on the other ( Parkinson et al, 2015 ). The former, they suggest is what creates an authorized version of interpretation, while the latter seeks to democratize heritage by placing it in wider, and often more popular frameworks.…”

“…One of the issues facing museums in China and elsewhere is how to better involve their visitors – in short, to respond to the need of the ‘inclusive interpretation’ noted by Parkinson et al (2015) within the realities of contemporary Chinese society. In many Chinese museums a range of methods have been added to the traditional patterns of interpretation since 2015.…”

Expanding Heritage Horizons through the Cheltenham: A Diaspora Project

“…The heritagization of a particularly narrow aspect of local and national forms is a relatively common element of the heritage process. In Ireland, similar emphasis on architectural forms has been seen to narrow community perception on wider forms of heritage value (Parkinson, Scott and Redmond 2016), Welsh industrial heritage narratives were left unvoiced until the 1980s due to nationalist bias against rural communities and traditions in the telling of Welsh history (Mason 2007), while in Pingyao, China, community heritage has been reshaped to cater to tourist demands, rather than Howell, D. 2020. Expanding Heritage Horizons through the Cheltenham: A Diaspora Project.…”

Morality, power and the planning subject

“…However, such a view is problematic given that several authors have shown how planners regularly adopt ethical stances informed by subjective values at odds with those ostensibly presented as legitimising 'objective' planning expertise (Lennon, 2015;Parkinson et al, 2016;Thomas, 1994;Upton, 2002). Consequently, failure to acknowledge the role played by subjectivity in planning activity may close the space Planning Theory (accepted but not copy-edited) Lennon, M. and Fox-Rogers, L. (in-press) Morality, Power and the Planning Subject, Planning Theory for critical attention to the moral assumptions underpinning planning practice.…”