CONNECTING SPACES: GOVERNMENT, SCHOLARS, MUSICS, AND MUSICIANS IN BRAZIL

In this paper I present some institutional attitudes surrounding the notion of cultural diversity and intangible heritage, as well as their possible implications. I briefly follow this notion as promoted by an international agency [UNESCO], incorporated by a government [Brazil], applied by certain institutions [Ministry of Culture and Petrobras] through specific cultural policies [Petrobras Cultural Program], which finally confer cultural, economic, and political capitals to specific groups. In its last projects, UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) has been trying to link culture with social equity. An example of this attempt is the 2003 ‘Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, ’ a project that places national cultures within a pluralistic political sphere able to empower minorities and to bring socioeconomic development to the countries. UNESCO defines Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) as “practices, representations, expressions, knowledge, skills – as well as the instruments, objects, artifacts, and cultural spaces associated therewith – that communities, groups, and, in some cases, individuals recognize as part of their cultural heritage.”1 This ICH can be found in five domains: (1) oral traditions and expressions (including language); (2) th