The MA programme in sustainable heritage management (SHM) at Aarhus University provides you with the competences needed to meet the multiple challenges of contemporary heritage management. Working with cultural and natural heritage means taking responsibility for the links between humanity and its past. But heritage is also an integral part of the present, and a resource for the future. Managing heritage is no easy task: it includes attending not only to the survivability and inherent qualities of sites, objects and traditions, but also to the different claims and interests that often surround them. The SHM programme equips you, through theory and practice, to work in the exciting and expanding as well as increasingly complex heritage field.
HERITAGE AS A RESOURCE
In all its forms, heritage is crucial for the collective memories and sustainability of communities as well as for the personal development of individuals, as it addresses the links between selves and others, temporally as well as geographically. As such, heritage can be seen as a crucial aspect of modern existence in a world of change. It can also be a potent economic, environmental and political asset that can be utilised for various ends. Heritage, for these same reasons, is not inherently good, and is sometimes put to work in ways that alter and compromise local communities and conditions in questionable ways. The Aarhus SHM programme qualifies you to analyse and respond to the ethics of heritage work, providing not only a sophisticated academic framework, but also a solidly grounded, practice-based set of skills and know-how.
A HIGHLY INTERDISCIPLINARY FIELD
Heritage studies and heritage management constitute a highly interdisciplinary field, involving methodologies and approaches from various disciplines. The SHM programme is anchored in an interdisciplinary research environment that includes scholars from archaeology, anthropology, intellectual history, aesthetics, history, museology, cultural studies, evolutionary studies and digital design. So during your studies you will work not only with material forms of cultural heritage, but also with textual data and, not least, people and peoples perceptions of heritage.
The two-year Masters degree programme in sustainable heritage management is equivalent to 120 ECTS. During the first two semesters, students will concentrate on theoretical and methodological aspects, and on application perspectives (e.g. the preservation of heritage in various contexts). The first and second semesters both comprise three courses, each of which is equivalent to 10 ECTS (see table). In the third semester students do fieldwork, complete an internship, or take an academic profiling course.
COMPETENCES AND JOB PERSPECTIVES
An MA in sustainable heritage management equips you with the skills and qualifications needed to work in a number of job markets and industries, depending on your area of specialisation. Possible career paths include employment in the museum and archival sectors, in planning and development agencies and bodies, within resource management and capacity building, as well as within tourism and the creative industries. Many of the challenges that you will be trained to meet are transnational and international in scope.
