Brazilian cultural heritage representation from the perspective of race relations: an evaluation of State narratives
heritage representation; cultural heritage; race relations; IPHAN; UNESCO; heritageization; representation; World Heritage.
The work hereby presented aims to develop the concept of cultural heritage representation based on the literature of cultural heritage, racial studies, and representation. With means to apply and consolidate the concept, an empirical analysis examines, from the perspective of race relations, the candidature reports of Brazil’s tangible and intangible heritage recognized by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) between 1980 and 2019. The process to integrate the World Heritage Lists begins at the federal sphere of the National Institute of Historic and Artistic Heritage (IPHAN) of Brazil, responsible for elaborating the candidatures and for its presentation at the international level, along with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The main purpose of analyzing those documents is to understand heritage representation in Brazil, with emphasis on the impacts of race relations. For that, the analysis considers symbolic representation, state narratives and institutions, entities and groups participating and integrating the cultural heritages in focus. In accordance with its goals, this dissertation is formed by a theoretical framework, a conceptual construction of the term cultural heritage representation, and a categorical analysis of the candidature documents of twenty Brazilian heritage sites that integrated the World Heritage Lists of UNESCO between 1980 and 2019.