How to develop Intangible Heritage: the case of Metolong Dam, Lesotho

Abstract

After ten years and extensive debate of UNESCO’s Convention on the Safeguarding of the Intangible Heritage (2003), workable definitions and frameworks for safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) are either emergent or non-existent. This is particularly significant in the case of heritage mitigation associated with large-scale construction projects: where these entail population resettlement and/or landscape loss, recording ICH is necessary both for impact assessment and mitigation and for helping impacted-upon communities cope with trauma. Nevertheless, there is little discussion of how to implement ICH safeguarding frameworks in salvage contexts.

This paper focuses on attempts to record ICH impacted upon by western Lesotho’s Metolong Dam. We highlight the practical shortcomings of existing ICH definitions and safeguarding protocols. We discuss the methodology used at Metolong and its ethical entailments, and take inspiration from UNESCO policy (and debates thereupon) and other sources in an attempt to find a workable framework for ICH recording in development contexts.

Keywords:

• Intangible Heritage
• development
• southern Africa

Acknowledgements

We thank our interpreters and colleagues Matikoe Matsoso and Pulane Nthunya for their invaluable assistance. The World Bank and Metolong Authority provided continuous support through this and all phases of the MCRM Project. We are grateful to Cornelia Kleinitz for providing us with Merowe Dam references. Above all, thanks to Peter Mitchell and Charles Arthur for their constant patience and encouragement. This research was funded by a Tweedie Exploration Fellowship for Students from the University of Edinburgh and a Clarendon Scholarship from the University of Oxford. Finally, we thank the two anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments, and we restate our gratitude to the residents of the Metolong Catchment for sharing their memories, stories, insights and opinions with us.

Notes

1 Interestingly, the updated ESIA (SMEC 2008) does acknowledge the concern of residents that the Phuthiatsana’s role as a conduit will be compromised (Article 5.3.14), but it remains just that: an acknowledgement.

2 It is informative that many of these questions may fall away if the term ‘Living Heritage’ (as preferred in some countries e.g. South Africa, cf. Deacon et al. 2004) is utilized instead, as the dispute between material and intangible does not then arise.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Luíseach Nic Eoin

Luíseach Nic Eoin is a DPhil candidate in archaeology at Oxford University. Her dissertation focuses on the material culture of hunter-gatherer plant use and processing in western Lesotho. She has related interests in contemporary economic botany and intangible heritage in the region.

Rachel King

Rachel King is a DPhil candidate in archaeology at Oxford University. Her dissertation addresses the archaeology of mixed farming communities in the last 500 years of south-eastern Africa’s Maloti-Drakensberg region. Her work is also concerned with ethical practice in Africanist archaeology, with particular reference to Lesotho.