Romeo Carabelli - Dissonant heritage, between authoritarian and colonial regimes

This intervention presents a specific type of heritage that is nowadays establishing itself as a distinct category. In the last two decades of the 20th century, a new concept emerged alongside that of cultural heritage. The concept is dissonance, forming the pair 'dissonant heritage'.Together, these two terms pave the way for a new heritage regime that is used to address items coming from countries that were dealing with autocratic government, such as former countries in the soviet bloc of Central and Eastern Europe, as well as the legacies of former Nazi and fascist countries in Central and South-western Europe.

This new regime calls into question the composition of heritage communities and 'heritage time', the latter of which is in a constant state of re-elaboration. The same reasoning is also applied to legacies established during the colonial era that are now on the path to either recognition or abandonment. This paper presents the development of this quite new concept, as well as its transfer from European territories to former colonial ones.