I have interacted many times with what I now call local identity and culture at different levels, sometimes with greater and sometimes less awareness.
Sometimes, the word culture, especially when followed by the adjective local, is overused to describe situations with little culture. It happens especially with what concerns me closely, and I would never have allowed myself to make the same remarks about someone else’s local culture.
This type of thought perhaps happened and happens to those who:
- has to work with the culture and traditions of the place where he grew up and lives (after a while, the same soup starts to become less tasty);
- has fortunately travelled and visited the rest of the world a bit, has terms of comparison in the Louvre, British, the Pergamon and the Prado (to stay in Europe);
- creates mental limits for him(her) self.
When I worked in the UK in 2011 and 2012, I could appreciate a different way of making and transmitting culture, a way that, even today, not everyone uses (yet!) that is the interpretation of heritage (the famous British heritage).
One thing that has remained very strong for me is the interest in finding out what local people value as their heritage and how much they want to share with others. In particular, having studied the sociology of tourism, it has always struck me that only in theory do we talk about keeping to ourselves, while in practice, we more often look for ways to show everything or almost everything to others, especially tourists.
Involving residents and stakeholders in a given territory is a challenging but beautiful way of working that can yield the best results for the territory’s management beyond its tourist interest.
In Italy, involvement in the tourism sector is so capillary that often, instead of discussing managing the territory and its residents, we only discuss managing the destination. In such a context, forgetting who we are is very easy.
If something like this starts to happen, we need to take action. One of the greatest allies we could have is the local culture, which is composed of traditions, myths, legends, and people of the past and present.
I wanted to go beyond my comfort zone and study research and cases in which local culture can be used as a contemporary tool to rediscover a community’s roots and needs.
In the following pages, I share an example from Rome and one from Great Britain.
Viviana Langher,*, Andrea Caputo, Daniele Brandimarte, Agnese Giacchetta, Anna Maria Grippo, Valentina Nannini del Dipartimento di Psicologia Dinamica e Clinica, Sapienza, Università di Roma are the authors of the research Symbols and meanings in a suburban’s local culture: A case study.
In Rome, psycho-clinical research at La Sapienza University in 2014 explored the local culture and perceived quality of life in the Colle Prenestino neighbourhood to understand the most valuable services to residents.
The data collected was analyzed to identify three factors that allowed the researchers to determine the local culture and the needs of specific population segments.
The first factor contrasts two female groups. They speak of the absence of a design development of the neighbourhood and its offer. On the one hand, the neighbourhood image appears strongly devalued, signalling a sense of powerlessness and maladjustment in the coexistence system. The neighbourhood is represented as an unlivable place destined to worsen.
The second pole sees the neighbourhood as sufficiently liveable, characterised by additive cohabitation processes and satisfying the inhabitants’ needs to a reasonable extent. Despite the revealed criticalities, there is no orientation towards change: one must either be comfortable with the neighbourhood or feel excluded.
The second group highlights a power dynamic between the three male generations. For different reasons, the young and the elderly embody the idealisation of the neighbourhood: They are allied in enjoying the beauty and prestige of the neighbourhood, devaluing the intermediate generation due to their lack of authority.
The middle generation comprises adult men who provoke relationships and signal the absence of a development-oriented production system.
Older people who founded the neighbourhood are in contrast to the second group of adult men (the sons) for whom the former worked hard.
The third group highlights the only dynamic that allows this area’s local culture to develop: the feeling of devaluation and exclusion that cannot be reclaimed or denied, the pain of forced adaptation, or the overbearing denial of critical issues.
The territory can identify a path of novelty, based on the capacity existing in the fabric of its culture, to create solid and productive social ties.
Citizens show low satisfaction with the quality of life in the neighbourhood. The most critical areas identified are mobility, safety, public activities and services, street conditions, cleanliness, and green spaces.
The development proposal presented by La Sapienza University research refers to the categories of inhabitants experiencing the most significant difficulties: adult males and women aged 45-65.
The services presented:
- A work orientation service;
- A policing service;
- theatre workshop on life stories;
- A community centre for young people;
- A neighbourhood psychology service.
It is not clear whether the initiatives indicated have been carried out. I couldn’t find information about the services proposed for the area online. My references are the Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/cdqcolle and the local association’s website. I would be pleased to be proven wrong and realise I have provided incorrect information.
In 2022, the government of Great Britain asked for the population’s collaboration (through the DCMS—Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee) to evaluate levelling the country (levelling in the sense of decreasing inequalities, thus, in short, improving conditions and quality of life).
The request for collaboration means receiving indications from those working in the cultural sector about what works and what does not.
The DCMS Committee’s survey examined funding for cultural initiatives and the extent to which the current model ensures that funds are distributed to areas that might previously have been excluded but are in need.
The MPs used these insights to understand how harnessing creative talent and local businesses can help bring crowds back to the main streets (which correspond to the streets with the most shops, bars and restaurants) and city centres, revitalising commercial buildings and protecting them from closure.
The objectives here are economic (direct and indirect) and social.
I found an answer from Professors Nicky Marsh, Daniel Aston, and researcher Michael Howcroft.
Professor Nicky Marsh, Director of the Southampton Institute for Arts and Humanities (SIAH) and Associate Dean for Research and Enterprise, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Southampton. Southampton.
Professor Marsh has 20 years’ experience working on issues related to culture and economics and has been PI of 5 AHRC/ESRC grants and Co-I of 2 others (worth approximately £1.5m).
Daniel Ashton is a Cultural and Creative Industries Professor at the Winchester School of Art and Researcher Analysis of Disparate Data and Unexpected Evidence at SIAH.
Dr Ashton has published and presented internationally on policy, labour and cultural industries.
Michael Howcroft is a SIAH researcher and co-creator of Feeling Towns.
Firstly, in the response provided by this team, attention is drawn to the need for caution.
I quote, ‘considerable caution is needed in understanding the role culture can play in addressing the geographical inequalities, structural disadvantages and economic and social decline of many English cities.’
This team’s experience in field and non-field research has yielded some interesting insights and recommendations that I share.
Local authorities are not fully equipped with the long-term research and sophisticated evaluation metrics that cultural planning and regeneration require. Community consultation on local cultural planning often involves a very narrow demographic, and the social capital needed to participate is not equally distributed.
External planning consultants and land and property developers’ interventions in regeneration programmes do not always include or meet the cultural needs of local communities.
These processes lead to a narrow vocabulary for imagining the future of places and depend on hard infrastructure (‘glass and steel’) rather than soft infrastructure (skills, expertise, networks). It significantly limits local cultural development, can inhibit the development of local creative skills, and contributes to a diminished sense of belonging, well-being and inclusive community building.
Moreover, coming back to my personal feelings, it is interesting that I am not the only one who thinks this way. In the research carried out by this working group, it was found that:
‘(i) There are different types of civic pride and not all types of civic pride, and not all of them necessarily testify to the success of a policy;
(ii) civic pride is temporary and fragile: not only is it difficult to measure, but it does not last long.’
The main recommendations made to the government of Great Britain are:
1. Better understanding of the legacy of historic programmes (such as ACE’s ‘Great Places’) and what reductions in funding from these programmes have meant for communities will help meet the needs of existing and start-up creative businesses and interventions at the local level. Understanding where previous support has worked (e.g., funding, business rate waivers, support for change of use, improved living conditions) will also help.
2. Support local authorities’ procurement procedures, extending their decision-making criteria to emphasise building and maintaining place-based relationships, such as grassroots community organisations.
3. Focus on developing a creative skills programme at the local level that includes a deep sense of place and belonging, well-being, and intergenerational.
4. Enabling smaller organisations and individuals to be better connected to their local decision-making bodies sustainably and effectively. The UK City of Culture (UKCoC) or similar programmes support cultures of collaboration by establishing specific infrastructure at the regional level that could include funding for training to support networks of trade unions and support diversity and inclusion in decision-making.
5. Develop a broader range of metrics to understand what creative initiatives bring to communities. These metrics should include civic pride metrics that are relevant, nuanced, locally specific, and appropriate for each levelling activity.
6. Use creative methods to enable more diverse and imaginative consultation, self-fulfilment, and city planning.
7. Avoid the rhetoric of exalting places for short-term ‘benefits’ in terms of civic pride.
I also agree with the recommendations sent in response to the questions asked in the call for cooperation.
The first question, in particular, shows us how culture, and local culture in particular, is not only what is shown but also the basis for doing more: exhibitions, creative spaces for young people, leisure opportunities for those who need them, and much more.
Question 1: How can culture revive our public spaces and shopping streets?
A change of focus is recommended, as single promotion events risk generating a debasement effect first and then gentrification. Instead, it is suggested that policies be developed that pay close attention to the richness, diversity, and rich and varied culture already present in public places.
In the authors’ experience, funding, low rents, and an enterprising community have made it possible to take over commercial spaces and make them alive and open to the community.
Spaces such as the Powerhouse in Hereford, the Creative Kids in Bournemouth, and the TOMA in Southend are active, inclusive, and have a strong vocation for creativity.
A further recommendation, should one wish to pursue this route, is not to let property developers, even specialised ones, work independently but to always partner them with existing organisations in the area to do more personalised work for the community that will use them. Existing organisations will help assess opportunities for creative operators and businesses, help communities tell the stories of their past, and have a say in planning for their future.
It is also recommended that if local councils and organisations are to compete for funding, resources should be provided for training.
Sara
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