By Andris Straumanis, George Mason University As an intern with the Smithsonian Institution’s Cultural Heritage Rescue Initiative, I am one of several students from George Mason University who have been spending the past several weeks cataloging museums and other sites in the island countries and territories of the Caribbean Sea that were hit hard by[…]
By Christina Fossa, Boston University Smithsonian Cultural Rescue Initiative Virtual Student Federal Service Intern, 2017 I am currently an intern for the Virtual Student Federal Services internship program for the academic year of 2017-2018. This internship, so far, has allowed me to contribute by working on the Syrian Cultural Heritage Inventory. I have been assigned a section[…]
I have been interested in the preservation of antiquities and objects of cultural heritage for years but the recent events in the Middle East, particularly regarding ISIS in Syria, have made me more impassioned and given me a great sense of urgency. After three summers of excavation in a burial ground in Southern Israel, my[…]
By Richard Leventhal, Executive Director of the Penn Cultural Heritage Center Cultural heritage and conflict are linked together in unexpected ways. My own work as an archaeologist with modern Maya communities has helped understand both the connection of heritage, conflict and development as well as the critical importance of these relationships for the future survival[…]
By Stacy Bowe, Project Manager, First Aid to Cultural Heritage in Times of Crisis 2016 Members of this research network study the causes of targeted cultural heritage destruction, but one of the questions that often arises from this difficult discussion concerns the aftermath: Is it possible to protect cultural heritage in the event of[…]
By Grace Golden, Administrative Coordinator for the Penn Cultural Heritage Center On Thursday, June 23, the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery hosted a screening of the documentary “The Destruction of Memory” as a kickoff event for the Conflict Culture Research Network. The event began with opening statements from Karima Bennoune, the UN Special Rapporteur in the[…]
The Geospatial Technologies and Human Rights Project of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), with funding from the Oak Foundation, investigated reports of the destruction of Armenian cultural artifacts by Azerbaijan that occurred between 1998 and 2005. Using high-resolution satellite imagery, AAAS documented the phased destruction of a medieval Armenian cemetery in[…]
Located in Mosul, Iraq, Nebi Yunis (also known as Nebi Yunus, Nabi Yunus and Yonus) is revered as the tomb of the Prophet Jonah. According to reports in July 2014, Nebi Yunis was deliberately destroyed by the Islamic State. Satellite imagery collected on 19 July 2014 and 30 July 2014 confirms the destruction of the shrine. Subsequent images[…]
By Brian I. Daniels, Richard M. Leventhal, Corine Wegener, and Susan Wolfinbarger Why is cultural heritage targeted during conflict? Under what circumstances? By whom? Cultural heritage represents the physical manifestation of culture and history and forms a major component of a people’s identity. We know that it is often targeted or destroyed during periods of[…]