Why innovate in safeguarding heritage?
Intangible cultural heritage (ICH) is fragile. It depends on people practicing it, and when communities shrink or young people migrate, traditions can disappear silently. Safeguarding, therefore, needs new methods: not just archives and lists, but also technological tools and participatory mapping that connect heritage to today’s society.
Innovation does not replace tradition – it supports it. By combining digital methods, community participation, and creative outputs, we can give new visibility and value to living heritage.
Technology and the idea of the “Digital Twin”
One major innovation is the concept of the Digital Twin – a detailed digital reproduction of a craft, performance, or ritual.
- Example: the Yangxin Cloth Paste technique in China was recorded step by step, so future generations can learn the process digitally.
- Example: dances can be captured with motion sensors, preserving every gesture for analysis and teaching.
Technology such as Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) can recreate lost contexts, while digital games and apps bring traditions into everyday learning for young audiences.
💡 But remember: a digital copy cannot fully capture the spirit of live performance. The challenge is to use technology as a support, not a substitute.
Mapping heritage: the CarPaTO project
Mapping intangible cultural heritage is part of a broader process of cultural mapping, defined as “a systematic tool to involve communities in the identification and recording of local cultural assets, with the implication that this knowledge will then be used to inform collective strategies, planning processes, or other initiatives” (Duxbury et al., 2015, p.2). Mapping ICH:
- Raises community awareness of local traditions.
- Strengthens identity by linking people to place.
- Creates opportunities for education and sustainable tourism.
- Makes traditions visible in creative and accessible ways.
CASE STUDY: Mapping ICH in Făgăraș Land: the CarPaTO project
The research project CarPaTO — Mapping the intangible cultural heritage of Făgăraș Land, Romania was carried out by a group of professors from Transilvania University of Brașov in 2018–2019, with university funding and at the request of the county administration. The main objective was to identify the ICH resources in Țara Făgărașului, an area with a specific historical and ethnographic identity, and to propose directions for safeguarding (Sorea & Csesznek, 2020).
Methods used:
- Interviews with cultural-heritage specialists from the Museum of Ethnography of Brașov, the “Valer Literat” Museum of Făgăraș Land, the Brașov County Center for the Preservation and Promotion of Traditional Culture, the Negru Vodă Foundation of Făgăraș and the ASTRA Museum of Transylvanian Civilization of Sibiu.
- Field research in the communes of Țara Făgărașului with city-hall and tourist-information-centre representatives.
- Building a digital database of identified resources, mapped against UNESCO’s ICH categories.
- Participatory workshops with residents.
Outputs produced:
- A research report and scientific articles.
- A colorful photo exhibition (shown at the Transilvania University Conference Center and at the History Museum of Făgăraș, in the medieval fortress).
- A culinary exhibition where traditional recipes were produced and tested.
- A cookbook collecting the recipes and culinary heritage of the area.
- A cellphilm — a participatory ethnographic video made with mobile phones, entitled “Țara Făgărașului 2019. Patrimoniu cultural imaterial”, organised in chapters that follow the UNESCO ICH categories, with traditional songs from the area as soundtrack.
- A set of cultural routes linking villages and landscapes to living traditions.
CarPaTO is a textbook example of how categorisation, mapping and technology come together. The cellphilm is the project’s most innovative output: it is neither professional cinema nor high-end technology, but a teamwork product involving the team members, former students who are vocal soloists, and the researchers’ own children (students at other universities) who helped with editing and English translation. It is an educational artefact and a model of low-cost, community-driven safeguarding.
▶ VIDEO: Interview Prof. Daniela Sorea — CarPaTO: exploring intangible heritage in Făgăraș Land
Study questions
- What was the main objective of the research project CarPaTO — Mapping the intangible cultural heritage of Făgăraș Land, Romania?
- Name two novel results of this research project.
- What is a cellphilm and how did the project researchers use this technique?
- How do you rate the making of a cellphilm as educational material?
- How are UNESCO’s five domains used inside the CarPaTO cellphilm? What does this say about the relationship between categorisation and safeguarding?
Exercises and applications (INTHRACE Pedagogical Model — Component 05 Sustainable Practices, Component 06 Technology & Innovation)
• Exercise 1 — Heritage mapping chart (Component 05): Choose one tradition from your community and fill in a chart: name of the element; who practises it; context (everyday, ritual, festival); mode of transmission; importance for identity.
• Exercise 2 — “At-risk ICH” rescue plan (Component 05): From the INTHRACE Application Example for Chapter 3: identify one ICH element in your region that is at risk because of poor classification (e.g. a hybrid practice that doesn’t fit any single UNESCO domain and therefore receives no protection). Investigate how this oversimplification contributes to its loss. Draft a one-page rescue plan: actors involved, immediate actions, medium-term safeguarding, classification framework to be used (Fredheim & Khalaf’s three-layer model recommended).
• Exercise 3 — Multi-domain Digital Twin for a disappearing weaving tradition (Component 05 + 06): Taken directly from the INTHRACE Application Example for Chapter 3: design a multi-domain Digital Twin for one specific disappearing weaving tradition in your region (or for Romanian wall-carpet weaving, already on UNESCO’s list). Specify what you record (visual, audio, textual, gestural), how the recording captures multiple ICH domains at once (craftsmanship + oral transmission + knowledge of materials), who owns the data, and how the community is involved at each step. Pair this with the Li et al. (2024) Yangxin Cloth Paste model discussed in the lesson.
• Exercise 4 — Cellphilm idea (Component 06): Design a short (2–3 minute) video project that documents a local tradition. Decide: who will appear in the film? What story will you tell? How will the community be involved? Inspired directly by the CarPaTO cellphilm methodology.
• Exercise 5 — Cultural route design (Component 05): Imagine a small route with 3–4 stops in your region, connecting traditions, landscapes and crafts. Explain how the route would tell a story about local identity. Reference: the CarPaTO route methodology.
• Exercise 6 — Generative-AI classification challenge (Component 06): Taken directly from the INTHRACE Application Example for Chapter 3: use a freely available generative-AI tool to classify three intangible heritage elements from your region. Compare the AI’s classification with UNESCO’s five domains. Where does the AI agree? Where does it diverge? What does this tell us about Fan et al. (2023)’s multimodal-attention approach to ICH classification?
• Exercise 7 — Multi-tagging digital exhibit (Component 06): From the INTHRACE Application Example: prototype a small digital exhibit (one slide, one webpage, or one social-media post) for one ICH element that allows multi-tagging — i.e. the same element is tagged with several UNESCO domains and several Fredheim & Khalaf values. Discuss: would users actually look for an element under all those tags?
Reflection questions
- How can technology enhance safeguarding without replacing living practice?
- Does digitalisation make traditions more accessible, or more vulnerable to being seen as “entertainment”?
- How does mapping heritage change the way communities perceive themselves?
- Which of the CarPaTO outputs (database, cookbook, routes, exhibition, cellphilm) do you find most effective, and why?
Could a CarPaTO-style mapping work in your region? Who should lead it — the university, the city hall, or a local NGO?