Visiting research student: Emilie Paaske Drachmann

Emilie is a PhD student based partly at the Danish Folklore Archives at the Royal Danish Library, partly at the University of Copenhagen. During the Spring term 2020 she is visiting UCL to gain more insight into the theoretical discussions on the politics of heritage and to profit from the expertise at the Centre for Critical Heritage Studies. 

Her PhD project looks at the politics and processes relating to intangible cultural heritage in Denmark. The overall research question is how intangible cultural heritage is constructed and negotiated in the process of applying for inscription on one of the lists associated with UNESCO’s 2003 Convention on the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage. 

Cultural heritage is in this project understood as a process of selection and inscription of value.  This process of heritagisation should be seen as a ”process of assembling”  taking place in a network of both human and non-human actors.  In my project, I want to look at how this process of assembling takes place already in the communities’ efforts to legitimise their cultural practices as intangible cultural heritage. Another important concept for my study will be the idea of different heritage regimes, as coined by Regina Bendix.  With the first ever national application process, Denmark represents a unique case for studying a national heritage regime in its unfolding.

While at UCL Emilie is sitting in room 116. Please send her an email epdr@kb.dk if you would like to discuss your project or her's over a cup of tea or coffee. 

Photo by Emilie Paaske Drachmann