Themes covered:
Digital Heritage and Technology Integration: Exploration of emerging digital tools; virtual reality; augmented reality, 3D modelling, aerial survey, digital twinning, 4-D data capture, photogrammetry, and digital archives that transform heritage documentation, preservation, and engagement.
Bio-cultural Heritage: New thinking and application of strategies to protect the biological and ecological life-sustaining heritages linked to land and sea, including discussion of biodiversity and heritage, traditional farming systems, socially significant and/or sacred landscapes and marine environments, soils, water sources, and community stewardship of natural resources.
Intangible Heritage: Advancing preservation and revitalisation of non-material heritage such as oral traditions, rituals, and performing arts through innovative approaches and technologies.
Heritage Risk Mitigation: New thinking on disaster risk management, how innovative methods and technologies can assess, monitor, and mitigate risks to vulnerable heritage sites and practices.
Natural Heritage and Contested Spaces: New approaches to management and interpretation of natural heritage in areas of social, political, or environmental conflict, addressing competing claims, governance challenges, and innovative approaches to conservation that recognise diverse cultural values and contested identities.
Economics of Heritage: New analyses and approaches to heritage economic issues, including sustainable tourism, heritage-led regeneration, funding models, and the challenge of balancing economic development with conservation.
Built Heritage and Heritage in Urban and Rural Development: Cutting-edge techniques that combine preservation, restoration, and reuse of physical heritage structures to meet contemporary needs; integration of heritage conservation into urban planning and rural regeneration to promote sustainable development.
Heritage Crime: Innovations in prevention and investigative methods to mitigate heritage crime including digital surveillance, forensic analysis, community-based monitoring, and international collaboration to combat theft, illicit trafficking, and vandalism.
Participatory Heritage: Memory, Trauma, and Healing: Analysis of approaches that empower local communities in heritage identification, interpretation, and management, fostering diverse and inclusive narratives while recognising heritage’s role in acknowledging past traumas, facilitating collective memory, and supporting reconciliation in post-conflict contexts.
