State Archaeology and Private Museum: An integrated approach to represent heritage values for local people

Summary

The legislative system of cultural heritage in China outlined cultural heritage management and archaeological activities fulfilled under exclusive right of state. This state archaeology proves its worth to increase the authority and quality of cultural heritage management, as well as to enhance the heritage values at the state level. The local communities, however, hardly embedded into the activities of cultural heritage management and archaeological projects, nor meet cultural heritage concerns of local people themselves. This paper considers that private museum as concerns of regional heritage values and benefits in the projects of state archaeology. With a case study of collaborations between archaeologists and local agents under the excavation and conservation of ancient kiln sites at Zibo, I argued that the private museums could be the relatively prominent platforms for public engagement in activities of state archaeology. It remains the further discussion, however, that lack of means to enhance the power of local communities to run the heritage management as the ethnical responsibilities of local people.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Heritage Values in Contemporary Society

Keywords

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