Search Results (1,518)

Environmental interpretation (EI) in protective forests remains an underexplored field, despite its demonstrated potential for fostering emotional place attachment and conservation attitudes. This study aims to design and evaluate in situ the “Magical Portal of Biodiversity and Culture” self-guided interpretive trail at the “Los Arrayanes” Protective Forest (16 ha, Montúfar Canton, Carchi Province, Ecuador), a native arrayan forest (Myrcianthes hallii) deeply rooted in the ancestral territory of the Pasto-Tuza people, and to formulate educommunicational strategies. The trail design is grounded in Tilden’s interpretive principles, Morales’s topic–theme structure, and Ham’s TORE model, and it formulates Environmental Education and Communication Strategies. A qualitative, multimethod design was employed, with in situ field observation, participatory action research (PAR) workshops with the de Monteverde community, and in-depth interviews with seven key informants (March–April 2026); data were analyzed through the hermeneutic interpretive method and validated through categories, method, and theory triangulation, member checking, and researcher reflexivity. The analysis yielded five emergent categories: (1) vital and heritage place attachment; (2) psychological restoration and sensory reconnection; (3) environmental curiosity and empathy; (4) situated conservation learning; and (5) community governance and intergenerational education. Additionally, it identified six educommunicational strategies: (1) sensory learning; (2) storytelling; (3) participatory interaction; (4) guided self-learning; (5) situated learning; and (6) the biocultural approach. These findings provide empirical evidence that biocultural interpretation promotes conservation attitudes and community participation. In practical terms, this research offers protected-area managers, community organizations, and interpretation planners a model replicable for designing self-guided interpretive trails in biodiverse territories where living biocultural heritage is at risk. Full article

Growing global challenges have made it imperative to evaluate economic activities not only in terms of economic growth but also from the perspectives of environmental and social well-being. Within this context, Women’s Production and Business Cooperatives have emerged as critical collective initiatives that support local development. In this study, “Women’s Production and Business Cooperatives” refer to cooperatives established and predominantly managed by women to collectively engage in the production and commercialization of goods and services, generate income and employment opportunities for their members, and promote women’s economic and social empowerment. Hereafter, these organizations are referred to as “women’s cooperatives.” However, studies that comprehensively examine the sustainability practices of women’s cooperatives through the framework of Elkington’s Triple Bottom Line (economic, social, and environmental sustainability) remain limited. From the perspective of Stakeholder Theory, cooperatives are regarded as organizations that extend beyond the pursuit of economic profit by creating value for both internal and external stakeholders, including women, local communities, the environment, consumers, and public institutions. Accordingly, this study aims to provide an in-depth examination of the sustainability practices adopted by women’s cooperatives within these three dimensions, as well as to identify the challenges they encounter. This study adopted a qualitative research design, utilizing in-depth interviews with seven presidents and managers representing women’s cooperatives. The findings suggest that zero-waste practices, the adoption of circular economy principles, and the transition toward green agriculture constitute the primary sustainability initiatives, whereas high technology and packaging costs, together with insufficient institutional collaboration, represent the major challenges to the environmental sustainability. Within the economic sustainability dimension, the findings indicate that the participating cooperatives have increasingly shifted toward industrial production standards, value-added by-products, and business-to-business (B2B) marketing strategies. Nevertheless, rising input and logistics costs, together with unfair competition, continue to pose significant challenges. As relates to social sustainability, the findings highlight intergenerational transmission of cultural heritage, psychosocial recovery, efforts to challenge social prejudice, inter-cooperative solidarity, and the allocation of resources for social benefit, including scholarship support. Overall, the findings reveal that these cooperatives make meaningful contributions to multidimensional sustainability and stakeholder well-being, thereby providing valuable empirical insights into the sustainability literature. Full article

Heritage management has traditionally relied on mapped boundaries. However, many traditional cultural places derive their significance from relationships, uses, memories, and responsibilities that extend beyond any fixed demarcation. This article conceptualizes this mismatch as a boundary problem: the tension between administrative systems based on fixed sites and the broader cultural geographies recognized by Indigenous communities and other place-based practitioners. Drawing on research from ecology, geography, anthropology, planning, and ontology, the article contends that this issue is not merely a matter of incomplete documentation but constitutes a fundamental structural challenge: integrating layered, relational places into legal and management systems designed for fixed parcels. Four types of boundaries are identified, each generating distinctive tensions in heritage work. The article proposes practical strategies, including representing gradients, employing flexible and co-defined boundaries, and shifting protective authority to tribal sovereignty and co-stewardship when imposed lines do not correspond to the places they are intended to protect. The analysis draws its regulatory framework and case material from the United States, but the underlying boundary problem is not limited to US practice; the article’s Limitations discussion situates the same structural mismatch in international heritage and protected-area governance. Full article

Artificial intelligence is increasingly shaping the preservation, interpretation, management, and reactivation of musical cultural heritage, especially in domains affected by technological obsolescence such as computer music, electroacoustic works, and analog audio archives. This perspective and case-study article examines the research trajectory of the Centro di Sonologia Computazionale (CSC) of the University of Padua through three analytically selected research directions: AI-assisted musical co-creation, multimodal generative systems informed by psychophysical research, and AI-based preservation of musical cultural heritage. The cases were selected because they represent complementary relationships between human expertise and computation (creative dialogue, perceptually grounded generation, and historically informed preservation) and because they include both completed studies and ongoing implementations. The article distinguishes previously published results, current implementations, and prospective components. It argues that the CSC case contributes a historically grounded model in which AI augments rather than replaces musical, archival, and interpretative expertise. Case studies include generative models for Disklavier performance, multimodal systems connecting sound with taste and emotion, a custom OCR and RAG workflow for Music V, and AI modules for analog-audio preservation within the MPAI/IEEE-CAE ARP framework. Full article

Vernacular architecture is studied as climate-responsive construction, cultural expression, material practice, and heritage, yet the literature does not always explain how fabric, skills, institutions, and environmental relations change together. This critical interpretive review asks what changes when vernacular architecture is conceptualised as living socio-material heritage rather than only as a building type, material culture, or environmental knowledge. An auditable search and citation-chaining procedure yielded 110 scholarly publications and seven official heritage documents and guidance sources, which were analysed through comparative conceptual coding. The review distinguishes three historically grounded traditions—environmental adaptation, cultural-interpretive approaches, and architectural anthropology—from three cross-cutting extensions: material engagement, sustainability and local/traditional or Indigenous knowledge, and biocultural niche construction. Their comparison supports a polycentric framework linking ecological and material conditions; making, dwelling and repair; learning and transmission; institutions, tenure, and community authority; and selection or adaptation decisions. Critical heritage scholarship treats designation as heritage-making that reallocates authority, expertise, regulation, revenue, and property effects. Living socio-material heritage does not present relational or process-oriented heritage as new; it reorganises those approaches around architecture-specific maintenance, transmission, governance, and adaptation mechanisms. A secondary-literature application to documented earthen-building change in northern Ghana illustrates, rather than validates, the framework. Five provisional propositions provide testable directions for research and heritage management. Full article

Whether agricultural cultural heritage (ACH) tourism supports sustainable heritage development depends partly on whether visits sustain the communication and internalization of heritage knowledge rather than merely produce favorable consumption evaluations. Drawing on experience economy theory, social identity theory, and tourism learning theory, this study constructs a mechanism model linking ACH experiences to tourists’ cultural learning. To reduce conceptual overlap, experience quality is defined as visitors’ perceived distinctiveness, novelty, and memorability of the visit, whereas perceived value is defined as a utilitarian assessment of gains relative to the money, time, and effort invested. ACH experience is therefore divided into three analytically distinct dimensions: experience quality, perceived value, and knowledge transfer. Cultural identity is introduced as a mediating variable and is understood as a layered psychological construct including cognitive recognition, affective attachment, and evaluative commitment. Income level is introduced as a moderating variable and is interpreted as a within-sample socioeconomic boundary condition after controlling for education and other demographic characteristics. In this study, sustainability is defined narrowly as the sociocultural continuity of ACH from the visitor side and is operationalized through perceived knowledge transfer, cultural identity, and self-reported cultural learning; income is used to examine whether this pathway differs across socioeconomic groups. Based on 430 valid questionnaires collected from visitors to ACH sites in Fujian Province, this cross-sectional study conducts empirical tests using structural equation modeling (SEM), Bootstrap mediation analysis, and hierarchical regression analysis. The results show that experience quality and knowledge transfer are positively associated with tourists’ cultural learning, with knowledge transfer showing the stronger association. Perceived value has no significant relationship with cultural learning, indicating that a consumption-level perception of value for money does not necessarily correspond to deeper cultural learning. Cultural identity fully mediates the statistical relationship between knowledge transfer and tourists’ cultural learning, revealing a dominant pathway linking knowledge transfer, cultural identity, and cultural learning. Income level positively moderates the relationship between cultural identity and tourists’ cultural learning. Because the data are cross-sectional and self-reported, these findings indicate theoretically consistent associations rather than definitive causal effects. The study contributes to sustainability research by offering a quantifiable visitor-side framework for monitoring knowledge communication, cultural connection, and learning-related outcomes. Repeated measurement of these indicators may support adaptive heritage management and inclusive cultural participation, but they should be combined with ecological, economic, and community-based indicators rather than treated as a complete sustainability index. Full article

Sustainable refurbishment of historic healthcare complexes requires more than the preservation of isolated material fragments. It must reconcile cultural significance, continuity of care, inherited environmental qualities, contemporary technical requirements, material compatibility, and future adaptability. Taking the application of prosthetic memory as its central analytical and operative framework, this article examines the refurbishment and extension of psychiatric units U1.1 and U1.2 at the San Francisco Javier Psychogeriatric Centre in Pamplona, located within the former Manicomio Vasco Navarro. Through a qualitative case study, this research combines historical and project documentation, typological and construction analysis, and a diachronic comparison of the original complex, its pre-intervention condition, and the completed refurbishment. Five indicators (typological, environmental, tectonic, material compatibility, and temporal continuity) operationalise prosthetic memory as a strategy for sustainable heritage management. The results show that selective dismantling, functional extensions, reorganised circulation, reactivated courtyards and gardens, and pigmented architectural concrete restored the complex’s operational capacity while preserving the legibility of its inherited structure. This study proposes a transferable, value-based framework connecting cultural significance, functional viability, and sustainable refurbishment. It contributes to the protection of cultural heritage and to waste reduction through prevention, reuse, and recycling, while requiring adaptation to each cultural, climatic, regulatory, and healthcare context. Full article

Lenggong Valley is an important heritage landscape in Malaysia commonly recognized for its outstanding archaeological, cultural, and environmental significance. However, increasing land use pressure around heritage areas may affect landscape authenticity, environmental quality, and long-term conservation planning. This study aims to analyze historical land use change and predict future land use patterns within the Lenggong catchment, a sub-catchment of the Sungai Perak catchment. Land use data for 2000, 2010, and 2020 were obtained from PlanMalaysia and reclassified into five major classes: water bodies, agriculture, forest, built-up areas, and vacant land. The ANN model was calibrated using the 2000 and 2010 land use maps, while the simulated 2020 map was validated against the observed 2020 map using Kappa statistics. Following validation, the 2010–2020 transition pattern and cellular-automata neighborhood effects were used to predict land use for 2040 through two consecutive 10-year simulation iterations. The results showed that forest and agriculture remained the dominant land use classes in the catchment. However, forest decreased from 58.9% in 2000 to 54.4% in 2020, while agriculture increased from 33.3% to 35.5%. Built-up areas also increased from 1.8% to 3.5% and were predicted to reach 3.8%. The model also denoted acceptable performance, with an overall Kappa value of 0.71 and validation accuracy of 83.1%. Within the 1 km heritage buffer, built-up areas increased from 3.6% in 2000 to 10.5% in 2020, with a projected increase to 13.2%. Overall, the findings highlight increasing development pressure around the Lenggong heritage landscape and provide useful spatial evidence for heritage-sensitive planning and long-term conservation management. Full article

Battlefield preservation is commonly understood as a matter of heritage management, historical education, or cultural tourism. This article argues that its origins and enduring significance lie elsewhere. Modern battlefield preservation emerged as a direct consequence of the transformation of warfare between the late eighteenth and twentieth centuries. Beginning with the French Revolution and the levée en masse, military service became increasingly associated with citizenship, national identity, and mass participation, while industrialization provided the logistical and technological foundations necessary for warfare on an unprecedented scale. As warfare expanded, so too did its human consequences, transforming military death from the experience of a relatively small warrior elite into a shared social reality affecting entire populations. Drawing upon military history, memory studies, sociology, religious studies, and heritage scholarship, this article examines how mass warfare generated new forms of collective bereavement, ritual commemoration, battlefield pilgrimage, and historical preservation. Through case studies ranging from the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars to the Crimean War, Gettysburg, the World Wars, and the conflicts in Korea and Vietnam, it demonstrates how expanding mobilization, industrialized conflict, and rising casualty rates produced enduring landscapes of memory. The article argues that battlefield preservation developed through a cumulative historical process linking mass warfare, mass casualties, collective trauma, commemorative practices, and the creation of commemorative landscapes. Preserved battlefields are not merely remnants of past conflicts; they are cultural institutions through which societies negotiate memory, identity, and meaning. As traditional sources of collective authority weakened in modern societies, battlefields increasingly acquired functions associated with ritual, pilgrimage, and civil religion. The expansion of warfare produced an expansion of remembrance, and the preserved battlefield emerged as one of the most enduring cultural responses to the human consequences of modern conflict. Full article

Heritage tourism has become an important driver of tourism development, particularly in Asia, where countries actively promote national and cultural identities to attract visitors. Although individual studies have examined heritage identity in relation to tourism, existing reviews have not systematically synthesised the theoretical perspectives, methodological approaches, and empirical evidence on how tangible and intangible heritage identities are utilised as tourism development resources across South and Southeast Asia. Accordingly, this systematic review addresses three questions: (i) how research on heritage identity in heritage tourism has evolved in South and Southeast Asia, including its publication trends, theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches; (ii) which forms of tangible and intangible heritage identity are most utilised in South and Southeast Asia; and (iii) what conceptual and practical challenges and future research directions emerge from the literature. This study presents a systematic literature review with narrative synthesis of 44 publications to analyze how tangible and intangible heritage identities are used to promote heritage tourism in the region. The findings indicate that most studies focus on tangible heritage such as monuments, archaeological sites and colonial architecture, while intangible heritage, including cultural festivals and living traditions, remains comparatively underrepresented. The review further shows that heritage identity plays a significant role in strengthening national identity, enhancing visitor experiences and supporting local economic development across South and Southeast Asia. At the same time, several challenges remain, including the underutilisation of heritage resources, limited recognition of intangible heritage and the need to improve visitor management and sustainable tourism practices. The study concludes that Asian countries have significant untapped potential to further integrate heritage identity into tourism strategies, particularly through more innovative uses of intangible cultural heritage and improved heritage governance and management. Full article

Living terraced cultural landscapes (LTCLs) bind together agricultural heritage, ecological function, and local culture. International instruments such as the Guidance and Toolkit for Impact Assessments, Enhancing Our Heritage Toolkit 2.0, and Preparing World Heritage Nominations guide heritage protection, but none integrates all four dimensions, and no LTCL-specific framework exists to diagnose a candidate site before formal nomination. Following PRISMA 2020, this review synthesized 61 peer-reviewed studies from the Web of Science Core Collection (2012–2026; screening Cohen’s κ = 0.82). Keyword co-occurrence mapping in VOSviewer, combined with manual thematic coding, produced six clusters that we consolidated into four analytical dimensions: heritage value, landscape integrity, tourism–heritage balance, and governance and protection. Reading across these dimensions revealed three gaps—no tool integrates all four in an operable form, the balance between tourism and protection lacks an explicit evaluative mechanism, and socioeconomic stressors such as rural labor out-migration fall outside official criteria—together pointing to a fourth, procedural gap: the absence of pre-nomination diagnosis. On this basis we propose IAF-LTCL, a preliminary conceptual framework of four dimensions and 22 elements, designed so that strength in one dimension does not offset weakness in another. The framework is not yet empirically validated; we present it as a structured starting point that heritage managers can use for pre-nomination self-assessment, pending future field validation. Full article

Tourism is a complex economic activity all over the world shaped by distinct local resources: culture, nature, industrial heritage, urban ambiance, place-based uniqueness, and geographical accessibility. The simultaneous governance and management of economic growth motives, preservation of the cultural heritage base, and respect for nature and ecological quality calls for an evidence-based and multi-faceted policy analysis that seeks to achieve sustainable development among conflicting policy objectives in tourist areas. The present paper seeks to explore the feasibility of a sustainable balance for various heterogeneous cultural heritage areas in Europe (‘urban pilot regions’), with particular attention to sustainable local development characterized by circular economic objectives and an ecological balance strategy based on the principle of stakeholders’ co-creation. The paper addresses the knowledge gap between generic policy aims and site-specific views of actors or visitors. To that end, an extensive survey experiment was administered in the urban regions concerned, in which a wide range of relevant management issues/questions related to environmental preferences and perceptions were posed to stakeholders and visitors. The data were analyzed by means of a novel respondent-oriented multivariate statistical tool, viz. Generalized Q-Analysis, which is suitable for handling big databases with many respondents. The paper shows that the application of Generalized Q-Analysis to common survey data enriches the results from the application of a conventional Q-Analysis. Furthermore, the study also highlights that, based on the views expressed by the surveyed visitors, the tourist areas concerned are quite different from each other in attracting specific classes of visitors. Therefore, functional specialization in the tourist sector seems to be an important anchor point for effective governance of urban tourism, not only in Europe, but also elsewhere in the world. Full article

Historic buildings occupy a sensitive position in contemporary energy and heritage management because they combine building-performance requirements, material-conservation constraints, and dynamic patterns of use. This study maps the broader historic-building literature at the intersection of energy-efficient restoration, building decarbonization, heritage conservation, and sustainable tourism, and interprets the resulting bibliometric structure with particular implications for historic stone places of worship. Records were retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection and screened through a PRISMA 2020-aligned protocol, yielding 804 publications. Accordingly, the 804-record corpus represents a broad historic-building and heritage-management evidence base rather than an exhaustive dataset restricted exclusively to stone religious buildings. Performance analysis and science mapping were conducted using Bibliometrix, while bibliographic coupling and longitudinal thematic-evolution analyses were added to examine contemporary research fronts and their temporal continuity. Co-citation analysis identified two partially separated intellectual schools—European conservation microclimate and adaptive reuse management—whereas bibliographic coupling revealed five current research-front communities, including adaptive reuse and sustainability, microclimate-conservation-energy, and an emerging HBIM/digital-documentation front. Thematic evolution showed increasing post-2019 convergence of tourism and management with conservation and cultural-heritage research, but continued separation from technical energy and microclimate streams. The study therefore moves beyond descriptive rankings to identify structural fragmentation and three priority directions: integrated monitoring of visitor loads, energy, and conservation performance; HBIM-supported spatial integration; and stronger cross-national research collaboration. The findings are interpreted as bibliometric evidence and research-agenda signals rather than as causal proof of building or policy performance. Full article

Historic gardens are among the cultural heritage assets most vulnerable to climate change because their significance depends on the continuous interaction between living ecological systems, designed landscapes and cultural values. Although international policies increasingly advocate the integration of climate adaptation into heritage management, operational methodologies capable of systematically incorporating climate risk into the conservation planning of historic gardens remain limited. This paper develops the Historic Garden Climate Risk Management Framework (HG-CRMF), a multi-scale, heritage-centered methodological framework designed to integrate climate risk management within existing Conservation Management Plans (CMPs). The framework was developed through the synthesis of international heritage conservation principles, climate adaptation policies, environmental risk assessment methodologies and adaptive governance approaches. Its principal innovation lies in combining strategic conservation planning at the scale of the historic garden with operational implementation through Garden Conservation Units (GCUs), spatially coherent heritage entities that enable site-specific assessment of heritage values, climate hazards, exposure, vulnerability, adaptation measures and monitoring indicators. The HG-CRMF provides a structured workflow linking heritage significance, climate risk assessment, adaptation planning, monitoring and adaptive governance within a single decision-support methodology. Rather than constituting a stand-alone adaptation strategy, the framework strengthens existing conservation planning by embedding climate-informed decision-making into routine management processes. Full article

Landscape Character Assessment (LCA) has struggled with scale mismatches and inadequate treatment of cultural expression when applied to high-density cultural landscapes in Asia. On the Chengdu Plain, Western Sichuan, China, remote sensing shows convergent settlement patterns across case sites, but fieldwork reveals substantial divergences in landscape character. We examined five cases representing different rural development models in the Chengdu metropolitan area. By integrating 10 m Sentinel-2 imagery and with systematic fieldwork (3200 photographs and 42 semi-structured interviews, July–August 2023), we constructed a framework that combines macro-scale spatial analysis with micro-scale field investigation. For macro-level quantification, six landscape pattern indices were adopted: number of patches (NP), patch density (PD), contagion index (CONTAG), aggregation index (AI), Shannon’s diversity index (SHDI), and Shannon’s evenness index (SHEI). The micro-level investigation followed a three-tier scheme (natural environment, settlement space, architectural details) to record vertical ecological communities, spatial expressions of cultural embeddedness, and visual landscape character. Indicator screening employed the KJ method and two rounds of Delphi consultation with ten experts; weights were then determined through the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). Macro-level results display a clustered, low-fragmentation pattern (woodland AI = 97.48, water body AI = 99.40), anchored by a stable mosaic of Linpan, farmland, water bodies, and homesteads. Micro-level features include multi-strata vertical communities of trees, shrubs, grasses, and water, along with cultural embeddedness expressed through irrigation systems, farming patterns, and courtyard layouts. The VLEAS (Vernacular Landscape Elements Assessment System) framework encompasses three dimensions (natural, cultural, and visual) and comprises 12 indicators. The cultural dimension receives the highest weight (0.42), followed by natural (0.32) and visual (0.26) dimensions. Comparative analysis shows that the framework differentiates cases with similar macro-scale patterns but divergent micro-features, capturing differences that a purely macro-index benchmark misses, and it also reveals trade-offs among ecological integrity, cultural heritage, and visual quality. Sensitivity analysis displays that case rankings remain stable across four extreme weighting scenarios (cultural, ecological, visual, equal), with only one swap (Xingfu Pastoral Park and Nongke Village) under ecological priority and no rank change greater than one position, confirming that the results are not driven by any specific weight assignment. This approach extends the utility of LCA in high-density rural cultural landscapes and offers a practical tool for differentiated conservation and management, especially in tourism-influenced rural settings on the Chengdu Plain. Transferability to other regions would require recalibration of locally relevant indicators. Full article