Museographical Perspectives on Modern Fortified Landscapes: World War I Defensive Lines in Italy

Europe is home not only to pasts that bring different groups and nations together but also to ones that threaten to tear us apart or generate negative emotions. If heritage is what we inherit from the past and what informs our sense of who we are today, then contentious heritage is that which is capable of throwing this sense into doubt and disrupting potential commonalities. Policies of silencing are not acceptable in democratic societies, nor could they potentially extinguish social conflicts. Discourses on identity must therefore be considered as permanent processes of dialogue across diverse positions, acknowledgement of differences, negotiation, and re-interpretation. The article relates to the research on difficult memories, focusing on a heritage that dates back to an era in which the continent was ravaged by fierce conflicts, frictions, and dominance aspirations. These events profoundly marked Europe and cast shadows on the present. Modern fortified landscapes are a peculiar museographical theme. The paper proposes a reflection on the museographical perspectives for diffused war heritage in Northern Italy.