Cultural Heritage Education: A Matter of Representation

In the processes of cultural heritage education creating new representations is crucial. Whether mental, visual, or textual, individual or collective, these representations are essential to identifying and communicating the cultural values embodied in each landscape. How then should representation intervene in the processes of cultural heritage education from an interdisciplinary perspective? In the ScAR (Schools Activate Resources) project, academics, teachers, students, and experts from a variety of backgrounds created and shared multiple interpretations of the everyday cultural landscape of a peripheral area in the South of Milan. The essay discusses the meaning and the different purposes of the process, focusing on methodological aspects, questioning the role of new technologies and the relevance of more traditional techniques. The chapter is divided into five sections. The first one, based on references from the philosophical, anthropological, and sociological spheres, introduces the theme of the heuristic and interpretative value of each representation and opens to the nodal relationship connecting cultural heritage and representation. The second one explores, in the field of heritage studies, the complex relationships between representation, visuality, and cultural heritage as a cultural and social process. The third section opens with the broad theme of the representation of heritage in education. The fourth and fifth develop this theme from the experience of the ScAR project, considering the role of schools and focusing on the peculiarities of heritage education in ordinary or degraded landscapes and marginal, fragile areas.