Valorising Jewish Cultural heritage to strengthen shared European values

Intangible cultural heritage is high on the agenda of the European Union, with special attention devoted to (intangible) Jewish Cultural Heritage (JCH). Jewish cultural heritage is recognised as an integral part of our European history and shared European values, and as a crucial lens through which to understand the history of Europe. However, Jewish intangible heritage is barely visible today whereas the tangible Jewish heritage is seriously endangered. This is why two recent briefings by the European Parliament, released in 2023 and in 2024 respectively, stress the urgency to undertake actions to preserve it. In 2024, an interdisciplinary team from the Breda University of Applied Sciences (BUas) joined the European JEWELS TOUR project as advisory partner. Subsidised by Interreg Europe, the project aims to valorise European Jewish (in)tangible heritage as a catalyst for sustainable tourism while simultaneously preserving it for future generations.

Today, preservation goes beyond the mere protection of material heritage. Since the Faro Convention (2005), protection is increasingly understood as focusing on the people who own this heritage and its connected intangible part. This makes cultural heritage preservation increasingly dependent on public understanding and cooperation, which imply understanding heritage also through active use. This active engagement defines what valorisation should mean. In this respect, an implicit yet strong connection exists between heritage preservation and accessibility,with tourism playing a pivotal role in removing barriers to it, not only structural or economic ones, but particularly educational and digital obstacles.

Understanding (European) Jewish heritage and enhancing its appeal and accessibility, also for tourism purposes, can be achieved through the development of off-the-beaten-path and special interest tourism (SIT). The discourse around Jewish heritage is often confined to the ghettos, a well-recognised and distinctive element in the history of European urbanism and as an expression of a material heritage in the narrative of European memory. However, Jewish cultural heritage encompasses more than these districts. These are the hidden stories that are not only related to tangible, but—even more importantly—to intangible Jewish heritage, like stories around gastronomy or traditional craftmanship or any other practices in living communities, which highlight the living nature of heritage, as a living system that evolves alongside society.

Valorising intangible JCH therefore also requires bringing to light underrepresented or hiddenJewish communities, identifying those who represent and voice current Jewish communities and acknowledging their stories. Building an understanding of (European) Jewish heritage in this way can help shape narratives that address contemporary issues beyond antisemitism or racism, encompassing broader themes of tolerance, equity, inclusion, and diversity. This approach creates space for dialogue with other cultural constituencies, as it entails more than simply preserving a certain past: it requires engaging critically with how this past is remembered and commemorated, whose stories are acknowledged, legitimised and transmitted to the next generations and how these stories resonate in today’s world. In this sense, understanding (European) Jewish heritage can help shape the future of Europe.

The project has brought together representatives from six different European cities with a historical Jewish presence to share best practices and knowledge, and to learn from each other and improve local valorisation efforts and tourism offerings. Across Europe, public authorities and local organisations increasingly recognise the need to enhance the visibility and accessibility of Jewish cultural heritage for tourism purposes sustainably – meaning in ways that benefit both locals and visitors, with attention not only to economic gains but also to cultural and social benefits. This includes considering the scalability and transferability of local intervention(s) to promote Jewish heritage they each develop locally and measuring their success through indicators that extend beyond economic impact.

Thus far, the project has identified four focal areas for partners to improve their local valorisation efforts:

• Enlarging stakeholder ecosystems across sectors, from heritage managers to scholars and educators, from tourism services and guides to local businesses and the diverse Jewish communities present in their territories, thereby strengthening social inclusion through enhanced feelings of ownership for the heritage in question.
• Enhancing storytelling around Jewish heritage to bring hidden stories to life. Storytelling serves as a tool to strengthen connections among heritage, memory, and education, and to create more cohesive stakeholders’ networks. This approach is termed responsible storytelling.
• Exploring digital tools to enhance access to heritage assets for tourism purposes.
• Developing training for heritage professionals through responsible storytelling and digital tools.

Insights emerging from the above mentioned points highlight a common ground among the project partners. First, each partner’s stakeholders’ ecosystem is highly diverse and varied. A significant challenge has been moving beyond ‘the usual suspects’ when engaging potential stakeholders—extending outreach past the local Jewish community, city authorities, and tourism services to include the broader non-Jewish community, diaspora communities, and those reconnecting with their roots and seeking to understand their origins and identity.

Second, there exists an urgent need to recognise, legitimise and tell the ‘hidden’ stories. These are stories that still very much live within the communities but are not known outside of them; they need to be unraveled and made visible and accessible. This makes them inherently place-based,embedded in each partner’s tangible Jewish heritage, made up of the physical spaces where this heritage is practiced and of the objects used to practice it. And they are therefore deeply rooted in their own territory. Because these territories constitute ecosystems comprising Jewish and non-Jewish communities, various stakeholders, and the distinct physical and geographical contexts of the six participating European cities, these stories must be told within these spaces and by the people who inhabit them. While heritage experts play an important role in identifying such stories, equity demands involving local communities, as research demonstrates that experts can inadvertently become ‘gatekeepers’ whose assessments legitimise and perpetuate certain stories and their associated communities at the expense of others (Rinallo, 2020, cited in Reid et al., 2023).

Digital technology emerges as a promising instrument for achieving these goals. Digitaltechnology, as a matter of fact, is seen as a tool that facilitates the collection and sharing of stories with equity by helping to ‘normalise dissonant memories’ (Bec et al., 2019, p. 118) through providing context that may be missing or poorly understood—context without which proper understanding would be difficult. By providing different perspectives and additional details about otherwise unknown stories, and by illuminating elements overshadowed in predominant narratives, digital technology provides a comprehensive lens on the past that enables reinterpretation, reimagination, and renegotiation. The better (or fuller) understanding this approach generates opens space for more equitable dialogue and for the actualisation of past debates. It allows the question of heritage as inheritance versus heritage as legacy (Harrison et al., 2024) to become more nuanced and less biased, supporting more inclusive and balanced heritage narratives.

The success of sustainable Jewish heritage tourism thus ultimately depends on genuine community engagement and the courage to tell all stories—not just the familiar ones. By embracing digital tools as facilitators of equity and enabling responsible storytelling practices, the JEWELS TOUR project partners are creating pathways for hidden narratives to enrich our understanding of European identity. As the JEWELS TOUR project continues to develop, it offers a compelling model for how heritage valorisation can serve both preservation and social transformation, ensuring that Jewish cultural heritage makes a meaningful contribution to Europe’s collective future.

References

• Bec, A., Moyle, B., Timms, K., Schaffer, V., Skavronskaya, L., & Little, C. (2019). Management of immersive heritage tourism experiences: A conceptual model. Tourism Management, 72, 117-120.
• Harrison, R., Rose, A., & Sterling, C. (2024). Ghosts of solid air: contested heritage and augmented reality in public space. International Journal of Heritage Studies, 31(4), 425–443. https://doi.org/10.1080/13527258.2024.2437367.
• Reid, P.H., Pirie, E. And Ironside, R. 2024. Telling the story of telling the story: capturing intangible heritage storytelling on the origins of malt whisky in the Cabrach. Journal of documentation [online], 80(2), pages 508-532. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1108/JD-06-2023-0106.
• Rinallo, D. (2020), "Heritage storytelling, community empowerment and sustainable development”, ???????????? [Provovedenie] Vol.64 No. 1, pp. 57-67.