Who Are We? Identity and Cultural Heritage
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Description
What is the realm called “the West”? What does it mean to identify with “Western culture”? In excerpts from his book The Lies That Bind, Kwame Anthony Appiah demonstrates how the notion of Western identity has formed the basis of hierarchies, status, and structures of power. The idea of Western culture represents a modern construction, a grand “Plato-to-NATO” narrative arc with its precursors in concepts of Christendom and Europe. Although this volume focuses on the protection of immovable cultural heritage, Appiah reminds us that all cultural practices and objects must be regarded as mobile, mutable, infinitely complex, and ultimately resistant to ownership by any single group.
Source Publication
Cultural Heritage and Mass Atrocities
Source Editors/Authors
James Cuno, Thomas G. Weiss
Publication Date
2022
Recommended Citation
Appiah, Kwame Anthony, "Who Are We? Identity and Cultural Heritage" (2022). Faculty Chapters. 89.
https://gretchen.law.nyu.edu/fac-chapt/89
