Religion, education, and cultural materiality: UNESCO World Heritage Sites

Book section : Chapter

This chapter argues for greater attention to be addressed to the collective historical wealth that is offered by the UNESCO World Heritage Sites as an entry point to study, teaching, and research on religion and education. The chapter outlines the distinctive features of the ongoing history of UNESCO World Heritage Sites, from the 1970s to the present, and sets them in the originating aims of UNESCO itself in 1945. Focusing on recent additions to the World Heritage Site list, four exemplars are used to evidence the case for the diverse and rich sources available to further understanding of religion and education through cultural materiality of historical artefacts. Such historical artefacts are, however, far from being of merely historical or past significance. Rather, these same historical sites resonate with broader themes of cultural understanding, a rationale which corresponds closely to globally accepted models which undergird the aims and purposes of religion and education, art galleries, and other important sites of local, national, and international significance.

Authors: Gearon, LF

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Host title: The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Education
• Pages: 370-390
• Chapter number: 21
• Series: Oxford Handbooks
• Place of publication: Oxford
• Publication date: 2025-05-22
• Edition: 1
• DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198869511.013.24
• EISBN: 9780191905841
• ISBN-10: 0198869517
• ISBN-13: 9780198869511
• Language: English
• Keywords: education; religion; UNESCO; United Nations; World Heritage Sites
• Subtype: Chapter