CALL

Extended Call for Abstract
[pdf]

The Future of the World Heritage Convention – a Nordic perspective

WHILD/Vasa 2011

The Second International WHILD Conference on the World Heritage Research will be organised by Åbo Akademi University in Vasa, Finland, December 14th to 16th, 2011. Prior to the conference, December 13th, a PhD seminar day will be arranged.

The conference is arranged in co-operation with the WHILD research network (The World Heritage: Global Discourse and Local Implementation) established 2003 at Dalarna University, Sweden. The aim of the WHILD/Vasa 2011 conference is to analyse the meaning, impact and future of World Heritages. We welcome participants, from all countries, with research topics fit into the conference themes.

The conference will address the following three key themes:

I. Which path will the World Heritage Convention take in upcoming years?
II. Local and Global Consequences of Cultural and Geographical Mapping
III. World Heritages and Transnational Learning in Tourism

The conference aims at having an interactive character opening up for broad discussions among participants. Each subject area will start with a key note address followed by a panel discussion. Thereafter a few papers will be presented and followed up by a panel and public discussion. Each panel discussion will be chaired by a scholar specialised in the research field.

Submission
The Organising Committee invites scholars and researchers to submit abstracts matching these three themes. Abstracts should be maximum 300 words long and submitted to the organising committee by May 31st, 2011 to whildvasa@abo.fi. Abstracts should also include information on the session in which the author proposes to present the paper, the author’s name and email address as well as the author’s institutional affiliation. Note that abstracts submitted by PhD students will be presented on the 13th of December (see separate information on the PhD call).

An international group of scientists associated to the WHILD research network will select 12 -15 papers among received abstracts. These authors will be invited to present their papers at the conference and will be given the opportunity to get them published. Information to the authors chosen will be sent by June 30th 2011.

Key note speakers and panel chair persons include

Professor and Holder of UNESCO Chair Marie-Theres Albert, BTU Cottbus, Germany
Professor and Director of Tourism Studies Antti Honkanen, University of Eastern Finland [pdf]
Professor Emeritus Erland Eklund, Åbo Akademi University, Vasa Finland
Dr. Jan Turtinen, Senior Adviser, Swedish National Heritage Board, Sweden
Professor Seija Virkkala, Department of Regional Studies Univesity of Vaasa, Finland
Director of the Botnia-Atlantica Institute Age Mariussen, University of Vaasa, Finland
Dr. Noel B. Salazar Founding Director of Cultural Mobilities Research (CuMoRe) at the University of Leuven, Belgium [pdf]

Welcome to Vasa!