Knowledge-scapes as Resources: An Archaeological Approach to the Construction of Cultural and Social Identities
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Concepts of ‘cultural memory’ almost directly equate knowledge of the past with culture, usually referring to textual and/or mythological evidence. From this perspective, research on cultural knowledge has its focus on valuation and canonization in relation to the construction, sustaining or altering of identities, rather than on practical and useful skills securing subsistence. However, cultural knowledge is based not only on texts and myths, but also on things, monuments and landscapes, representations as well as body practices and emotions. Thus, knowledge-scapes as networks or meshed bundles connecting knowledge with shaped things, designed spaces and monuments, as well as associated body practices directed at senses and emotions, can be seen as resources in which cultural memories are actualized, representations of social groups are constructed and social spaces are generated. It will be argued that knowledge-scapes conceptualized as resources of identity building are closely connected to sacred spaces in a broad sense of important public spaces set apart. From an archaeological perspective, different types of features related to sacred spaces can be analysed as evidence of knowledge-scapes. The Heroon of Poseidonia/Paestum is discussed as a case study of knowledge-scapes related to the construction of the past.