Cultural heritage as a mediator of knowledge, with Hjo citycenter as an example

The purpose of this thesis is to describe what mediation of cultural heritage can look like today with a focus on the built cultural heritage. Hjo city centre serves as an example of the mediation of the built cultural heritage in this thesis. Hjo is a small city dating back to the Middle Ages, located by the shore of Lake Vättern in Sweden. To deduce how Hjo as an example works as a mediator of cultural heritage this thesis includes a study where Hjo is analyzed according to several methods that describes how cultural heritage can be mediated. These methods are the following: "Cultural heritage as a communication process", "Authorized Heritage Discourse", "Cultural heritage as a cultural process" and "Norm creativity - including mediation". The analyses conclude that Hjo city centre in many ways works as a mediator of cultural heritage and that cultural heritage is changeable. Mediation of cultural heritage must therefore also be changeable and not fixed in its form. There is consent in the field of cultural heritage that there is a need for a new take on what cultural heritage is and how it should be mediated. The tradition of cultural heritage has promoted the preservation of cultural heritage specific to the high society and what is considered beautiful. It is time for a change that promotes a broad image of what is considered to be cultural heritage and who should be allowed to mediate the cultural heritage. To evolve we have to acknowledge that there is a need for broader representation in educations focusing on cultural heritage and to do so cultural heritage has to be incorporated in the educational system early on. The future of mediation of cultural heritage needs to be inclusive and portraying a broad picture. Not only what is considered to be beautifulUppsats för avläggande av filosofie kandidatexamen med huvudområdet kulturvård med inriktning mot bebyggelseantikvarisk verksamhet 2019, 180 hp Grundnivå 2019: