Design Context

The emergent theme was that ICH is inherently linked with the identity of an individual, which can be reinforced by sharing own examples of ICH with others and by reflecting on it. Additionally, young adults in their 20s indicated that they encounter diverse perspectives during travel and exploration that shapes how they perceive the world and themselves in it.

Solo Travellers

Having observed the common trend correlating solo travel with “finding yourself” among the young adults, this user group fit naturally. They seemed to have been on an identity-reinforcing journey already.

experience

Timeline: 100 days

Team:

Collaborators: Werkplaats Immaterieel Erfgoed, Belgium and Museum Futures Lab

Supervising committee: Mieke van der Bijl-Brouwer, Arnold Vermeeren, Jorijn Neyrinck

Key Activities

Context research
Participatory research
Workshop design and facilitation
Visualizing insights
Concept development
UI design (Figma)
Blended experience design
Testing and validation
Stakeholder value creation
Value proposition
Project management

Living Heritage or Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) is a fairly new and lesser-known concept. With its presence in daily life as traditions, rituals, languages, know-hows, belief systems and the like, it forms the very essence of people’s culture and one's identity.

This project intents to guide and enable young adults/youth between 18-30 years to explore ICH such that it incites reflection and sharing, which in turn make the young adults realize their culture and identity.

Research Goal

How can Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) be relevant to the youth who might encounter ICH in any form?

Design Goal

To enable and guide young adults who are global citizens with identity development through sharing and reflection while exploring ICH.

Hidden Culture Experience for Solo Travellers

Contextual Deep Dive

What is Intangible Cultural Heritage as per UNESCO?

"Intangible Cultural Heritage” means the practices, representations, expressions, knowledge, skills – as well as the instruments, objects, artefacts and cultural spaces associated therewith – that communities, groups and, in some cases, individuals recognize as part of their cultural heritage. This intangible cultural heritage, transmitted from generation to generation, is constantly recreated by communities and groups in response to their environment, their interaction with nature and their history, and provides them with a sense of identity and continuity, thus promoting respect for cultural diversity and human creativity.

Scope

Global experiences shape our identities, often prompting the question - "Who am I?" This self-exploration is particularly crucial for adolescents and young adults transitioning to adulthood. Today, this process complicates further as internet connectivity and online profiling play into this exploration of the self where individuals must navigate how to present themselves authentically.

While globalization and technology have connected us and increased convenience, they've also influenced youth's social behaviours and their connection to intangible cultural heritage. For living heritage to survive, it must be actively practiced and transmitted to next generations.

No standard definition of "heritage"

Much like the definition of sustainability that evolves every few years, the evolving interpretation results in changing perceptions and operationalization of what sustainability means to different actors. No two people have the same understanding of sustainability, nor a similar practice.

Similarly, to understand ICH based on a definition is ineffective and simply not enough. Instead, it would be useful to recognize the characteristics of ICH.

Global, Hybrid, Homogenous

UNESCO (2018) considers ICH the "mainspring of diversity in the face of growing globalization." The counter-argument to globalization as a diversifying phenomenon is that it invites cultural hybridity.

Globalization can erode the very essence of diversity—people's culture and heritage. While those born before the rapid onset of globalization experienced ICH firsthand, later generations have entered a world of cultural fusion.

This global interconnectedness raises concerns about the homogenization of cultures worldwide.

If we forget what makes us authentic—our culture—we risk blindly following global trends. Consequently, ICH is more crucial now than ever before.

ICH & the youth

Young adults of today live in a super-hybrid and diverse world. Therefore, having the youth’s attention to their own ICH is not only challenging but also a continuous effort in quickly changing realities.

The same young populations are today’s decision makers and future elders. The generation ready to lead, change and transform, the youth are now making decisions about their heritage. However, to
make an informed decision, the youth needs to know that ICH exists and even they have it.

Due to the disconnect between the youth and their ICH, the youth’s purview seldom considers ICH while making decisions. This can be attributed to ICH being a new concept but it is not very accessible yet.

It spotlights the relevance of ICH in the youth’s lives.

Stakeholders

The youth is one stakeholder in an entire ecosystem of heritage. For a holistic perspective on the youth’s ecology, various voices in the system are engaged to capture their perspective. Among the multiple stakeholders related to heritage, 3 main groups of actors are identified.

Propagators

These are organizations, institutes, foundations, groups or individuals actively attempting to inform and educate the public at large about some form of ICH. They can either be formally or informally organized parties that portray the ICH to the people. Their scope of work is led by the intention that more people know and care about cultural heritage in order to motivate safeguarding action. Many times, they also take responsibility to identify ICH and safeguard it alongside the custodians.

To bring in the propagators’ perspectives, we need to understand their current approaches and the challenges they face while engaging the youth with ICH.

What challenges do the propagators experience while engaging the youth with ICH?

Custodians

These are individuals or communities who (attempt to) ‘live’ the heritage or own the heritage - they are the practitioners and carriers of the knowledge. They actively try to transmit their ICH in order to safeguard it. They are driven by the urge to share with their own communities, the next generations and others. They create, maintain and transmit ICH.

Although custodians often work closely with the propagators, it is observed that they rarely operate with a strict institutional agenda. They mainly navigate through the transmission of their ICH based on instinct and sensitivity. For this reason, it is assumed that their approach toward the youth is slightly different.

How can we identify and integrate the desires the custodians have for the youth and ICH?

Youth

There are nescient experiencers of Intangible Heritage, unaware of the concept. For this project, the youth are young adults between the age of 18-30 years, who are in a transitory period of life.

As Smith & Dowse (2019) put it, transitory periods refer to the time when a young person is faced with multiple:

critical moments related to family, education and relationships,
liminal moments or feeling trapped in-between, or
meaning-making moments which reinstate equilibrium and stability.

These essential moments contribute to the development of the sense of self of a young person (Erikson, 1968).

How can youth be supported in finding ICH
relevant?

Workshops, Interviews, Reflections

Considerations for participatory research

ICH is rooted in context and personal experiences. Thus, the research with the youth needed to stimulate the generation of insights through discussion that help the participants observe and reflect on their interactions with ICH examples from their own lives.

These insights were generated in several participatory workshops that led to:

the criteria and considerations for further design.
the creation of the Identity Framework in relation to intangible culture.

Guiding design

Key criteria for design

Sharing about ICH happens in a diverse context. That’s when the youth thinks about their cultural identity.
Prompting the conversation on ICH inherently leads to speaking about identity – which is important for the youth to reinforce their sense of self.
A safe space is necessary for the sharing as there is the possibility of tension, difference of opinions or conflict that could arise with certain controversial ICH practices.
Sharing can be prompted by someone who understands both – youth and heritage to get the youth started with thinking about ICH.
Time and space are essential when reflecting on identity, which could be guided by a tool or set of tools youth can use by themselves. The tool(s) serve as the guide.

Considerations for design

Design should be set in a context that the youth frequents and feels familiar with, to enable the youth to see parallels in their life and ICH.
Design should cater to making it easy for the propagators and custodians to get started with engaging with the youth.
Design should allow for young adults to participate in ICH related activities and practices.
Design should prompt a dialogue between the custodians and the youth.
Design should tap into the current needs and desires of the youth as a way to get to ICH.

Hari's Journey

Validation

The desirability of the experience was tested with solo travellers, the feasibility with WIE and the viability with other stakeholders (such as a Hostel, Regional Government Tourism Office and a Local Heritage Organisation) .

As time was limited, the evaluation plans were created simultaneously to the concept development. Therefore, the tests were conducted with preliminary prototypes.

Hostel Owner in the Netherlands

The hostel owner found it interesting but was skeptical about being an early adopter. He stressed about wanting to retain his guests and engage them in the activities the hostel plans. In general, the interest of the hostel was to have a direct link to their guest. “The concept is an impressive example to see how you can get people connected both online and offline”.

Representative of Local Heritage Organisation

She had concerns about curating for a younger audience. She mentioned that most colleagues and volunteers that work in such local heritage organizations are retired or elderly. She worried that a translator would be required who could work on both ends. For example, this translator would need to understand the custodians offering through the propagators and then make the information available in a youth-friendly way for the Hidden Culture Experience.

23 year-old from the Netherlands

“I love it! It sounds really fun. I like that it gives the feel of carrying a Lonely Planet that gives insider clues.”

27 year-old from Turkey

"I like the map, I can make my notes on the back of it and really make it my own."

Sara, WIE Team

“A lace maker who gives workshops only when a minimum of five people present. It would be interesting to have five people from different hostels.” It gives an idea of “on this day, I can buy the lace but also watch the practitioner make it and give an explanation”.”

Representative of a Regional Government Tourism Office

“Certainly very interesting how you approach the scope of ICH without narrowing it down to any one domain or theme (like processions or festivals). You look at the daily lives of people. We often think a lot is obvious but when people are coming from abroad, it’s not.”

Solution

The experience has several entry points specifically created to invite various types of solo travellers, catering to preferences between digital or physical and social or independent ICH exploration.

The experience has 3 main functions, to enable:

Sharing and Reflecting
Exploring and Reflecting
Realizing and reinforcing identity

Journey
To explain the intricacies of the experience, we journey with three characters - Hari, Blaze and Skye. These characters are based on the archetypes of solo travellers. The goal of the experience is to give our youth characters a taste of reflection on their own ICH and sharing about their ICH with those from different perspectives while they explore and travel.