Unveiling children’s perceptions of World Heritage Sites: a visual and qualitative approach

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates World Heritage (WH) perception from the perspective of children, both as physical representations in space and as experiences and understandings of place. The Little Artists Exhibition serves as a case study. This exhibition was a global call initiated by UNESCO inviting children between 6 and 12 years old to draw a WH site that matters to them. More than 500 children participated in the online exhibition and posted their artwork on Instagram. By proposing a mixed visual and qualitative text analysis method for the assessment of children’s drawings and narratives, this paper captures both children’s perceived image and values of WH. Results show that children express a holistic perception of heritage combining built, natural, and intangible assets. Correspondingly, findings from the qualitative text analysis highlight: (1) children’s historic and aesthetic appreciation of WH; (2) children’s emotional and experiential association with built heritage and natural landscape; (3) children’s inspirational and imaginative stories; and (4) heritage as a social construct in the minds of children. We discuss our findings by reflecting on their conceptual contributions as they speak to broader debates on WH and associated values.

KEYWORDS:

• Cultural heritage
• perceived value
• visual perception
• intangible heritage
• children’s artwork

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank our two research assistants, Omar Youssef Mahfouz and Amer Al Baba, for their assistance in developing the codebook.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the office of Graduate Studies and Research (GSR) at the Lebanese American University (LAU).

Notes on contributors

Manal Ginzarly

Manal Ginzarly is a postdoctoral researcher at the Lebanese American University. She completed her Ph.D. at the University of Liège and her Master’s studies at the American University of Beirut. Her inquiry combines urban governance and heritage management. In her research, she focuses on people’s construct and definition of heritage, the social and cultural values attributed to exceptional and everyday heritage, and the co-production of heritage knowledge. She works on methodological approaches dealing with social media to foster inclusion and civic engagement in heritage management and to provide additional knowledge on the diversity of heritage places and attributes.

F. JORDAN Srour

F. Jordan Srour is an associate professor in the Information Technology and Operations Management Department at the Lebanese American University. With a background in mathematics (BA from Carleton College), civil engineering (MSE from UT Austin), and logistics (Ph.D. from the Rotterdam School of Management), her research focuses on data analytics applied across a range of fields including transportation, construction, human resources, archeology, and heritage. Her research has been published in recognized journals including the Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, Transportation Science, Journal of Business Research, Transportation Research, Part C and Computers and Operations Research.