Cultural Heritage in Transition: What Germany Chooses to Preserve
What a society chooses to preserve says a great deal about how it sees itself. Germany’s latest federal heritage funding programme shows that the understanding of cultural heritage is broadening: alongside churches, castles and palaces, industrial sites, infrastructure and places associated with everyday life are increasingly coming into focus. Prof. Johannes Kiessler, Dean of Art & Design at the University of Europe for Applied Sciences (UE), explores what this shift reveals about our understanding of cultural heritage and identity.
More than 140 projects are receiving funding under Germany’s 14th Special Programme for Monument Protection. The range is remarkable: from Aachen Cathedral and historic synagogues to former industrial sites, bridges, Leipzig’s Bruno-Plache-Stadion and the museum ship Cap San Diego in Hamburg harbour.
The list therefore reveals more than which historic structures are due to be restored. Decisions about which places should be preserved also shape our understanding of what a society considers culturally and historically significant.
“The real transformation in heritage protection is not taking place in the buildings themselves, but in the way we look at them. For a long time, monuments primarily told stories of power, religion and national representation. Today, we increasingly recognise places of work, infrastructure and everyday life as important testimonies to our history and identity,” says Prof. Johannes Kiessler, Dean of Art & Design at the University of Europe for Applied Sciences.
When bridges, factories and stadiums also tell our history
This shift in perspective is particularly evident in the growing recognition of industrial and infrastructure heritage. Projects receiving funding include the Junkers halls at the former Oberschleißheim airfield, the Hilbersdorf railway depot in Chemnitz, a historic textile factory in Mülsen and the Hansa bridge complex in Dortmund.
Historic bridges, organs, Jewish cemeteries and buildings in smaller communities are also included in the programme. Cultural heritage is therefore becoming less defined by size, prominence or representative architecture and more by the stories a place can tell about social and historical change.
This also changes the meaning of heritage protection. It is no longer simply about preserving historic structures as unchanged as possible. Heritage sites can make visible which experiences and developments become part of our collective memory – from religion and political history to industrialisation, work, migration and technological progress.
Heritage protection as a question of identity
For Kiessler, this gives heritage protection a broader social and cultural dimension.
“Heritage protection is often reduced to preserving historic buildings. Yet it also provides an opportunity to reflect on and further develop our own identity. It begins with the questions: ‘Who are we?’ and ‘Where do we come from?’ – questions that also help us understand where we want to go as a society.”
Germany’s current funding list can therefore also be read as a snapshot of how the country understands its cultural heritage today. Alongside the major symbols of national history, greater attention is being given to places where people worked and lived and where economic, social and technological change took place.
Heritage protection does not simply document the past. It also reflects which stories a society considers relevant today and chooses to pass on to future generations.
More information about this topic you may find here: Which History Does Germany Want to Preserve? What the New Heritage Funding List Reveals About the Country’s Cultural Self-Image – UE
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