At a recently concluded three day workshop on ‘Documenting India’s Intangible Cultural Heritage’, conveners, co-conveners and resource persons from various chapters of INTACH in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Kerala and New Delhi, drove home the point that India as a repository of countless performing arts, local health practices, indigenous knowledge systems and rich language traditions spanning generations could ill-afford to destroy or lose it.
The difference between tangible and intangible culture heritage was well explained by various speakers including Dr.C.T.Misra, Member secretary, INTACH, New Delhi and Ms. Nerupama Y. Modwel, Director of ICH, among others. While tangible culture is represented by the work of arts, historic sites and monuments, intangible heritage is its counterpart and includes songs, music, dance, drama, skills, and other cultural material that can be recorded but cannot be touched, experienced or interacted with, without a practitioner of the same.
The ICH division of INTACH started in 2008 has been working on various aspects of the subject, including documentation in tribal areas, holding important international seminars on endangered languages in India, documentation of dying crafts and traditional knowledge, conducting workshops, and promoting intangible heritage. And all this is achieved through a series of ongoing festivals, quizzes and panel discussions with support from its 170 chapters across the country.
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Dr.Misra reminded the audience that safeguarding intangible heritage did not imply living in the past, as this heritage always lends itself to a process of continuous evolution and adapts to its environment. “Documenting it can be a movement to reclaim our roots, or revitalise endangered elements but we must be cautious about not mixing the intangible with the tangible because the latter is built by peoples’ knowledge, skills and ideas and the intangible captures the memories in different forms so that it lives beyond time, for posterity,” she said.
Dr.Misra said she was happy that lot of youths were coming forward to know more about our heritage and one should make use of social networking sites to disseminate information. “Technology is an essential part of our heritage now and we cannot escape it. Rather we should use IT to optimum and preserve the heritage forms for the future generations,’’ she added.
She informed that INTACH heritage academy is a new initiative with plans for offering diplomas and degrees in the future. At present it offers crash training courses to sensitise a cross-section of professionals and community members in order to make them the custodians and protectors of heritage.
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INTACH Tamil Nadu State convener, S.Suresh, Madurai convener Dr.Uma Kannan, and historian R.Venkatraman, also spoke at the meeting and agreed to come up with specific proposals and promote more heritage walks and tourism initiatives that would give an insight into the fabric of society and a community’s philosophy through various art forms.
Quote:
“Safeguarding living heritage does not mean we have to freeze it. But we have to ensure that people continue to see the relevance in it and practice it too because any intangible heritage inherits our social and ritual life.” -- Nerupama Y. Modwel