Establishment
SENSE
A Field Guide to Science & Culture
Theory . Storytelling . Transformation
The web page clip (edited and reproduced below) aptly describes the recent past and future direction of Cultural Resources Management (CRM) research and Historic Preservation civic tourism:
"... send them out into the world, have them report back. I don't actually want raw, unmediated access for I expect to be thoroughly cossetted. I need information that is more voluminous, less managed, and more personal than ever before -- vicarious consumers, an exchange mediating buyers and sellers, some managerial capability, some test cases, a little research, not very deep pockets, a website..." [cf. April 03, 2006 The Experience Exchange, by Grant McCracken].
Sounds like the services offered by the Pecos Conference, Crow Canyon, and Old Pueblo.
I often think of a friend who spoke of his experience accessing the pyramid entrance into the Louvre Museum. By disclaiming such knowledge, he attempted establishment -- setting a put in an open-market exchange measuring his knowledge and worth. Relative pricing -- certainly, his knowledge and experience more valuable when others around him did not possess the first-hand experience.
The world works precisely this way. And, this is why the technologies of education -- and the works of great literature and science research -- remain so vitally important down through the ages.
The tools and products of literacy provide a democratic means to distribute useful, consumable, and testable knowledge with values that far exceed the value of the entertainment knowledge for which we so often settle.
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