Open‐Air Museums As Mediators for Intergenerational Transmission: Taking As Example Two Ethnographic Open‐Air Museums in Georgia and Ukraine

Abstract

This article posits that open‐air museums, with their unique capacity for sustaining values, safekeeping material and immaterial knowledge of culture and creating opportunities in social and economic realms, play a specific role in making changing societies sustainable and inclusive as active players in creating space for intergenerational transmission. Taking as examples two open‐air museums in CIS countries―namely the Giorgi Chitaia Open‐Air Museum in Tbilisi, Georgia, and the Folk Architecture and Rural Life Museum in Lviv, Ukraine―where UNESCO and several countries pooled skills and knowledge for their revitalisation―it will discuss the lessons learnt and the contextual understanding of ethnographic open‐air museums in former Soviet Republics as platforms for intergenerational transmission and learning. In doing so, this paper could provide a framework for other open‐air museums to take advantage of their unique resource.

Safeguarding Traditional Crafts in Europe

“…This is primarily the case for crafts, as many have a common base across Europe and are of cross-border nature. As a form of ICH, crafts are transmitted across generations, providing communities and individuals with a sense of identity and continuity, creating more resilient, competitive, and culturally aware societies [7][8][9].…”