ELPHi, Electronic Library of Public Historyhttp://elea.unisa.it/xmlui/handle/10556/48782026-05-09T05:31:35Z2026-05-09T05:31:35ZPublic History IT. Numero 11 - Gennaio 2026http://elea.unisa.it/xmlui/handle/10556/92472026-02-26T08:10:19Z2026-01-01T00:00:00ZPublic History IT. Numero 11 - Gennaio 2026
2026-01-01T00:00:00ZTowards a Public Architectural History: Collective-Use Facilities and Community Engagement in Portugal and SpainAgarez, Ricardo Costa < DINÂMIA’CET-Iscte,
Centre for Socioeconomic and Territorial Studies, Instituto Universitário de
Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), Av. das Forças Armadas, 1649-026, Lisbon, Portugal>Pascoal, Ana Mehnert <DINÂMIA’CET-Iscte,
Centre for Socioeconomic and Territorial Studies, Instituto Universitário de
Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), Av. das Forças Armadas, 1649-026, Lisbon, Portugal>Herrera-Pineda, Ivonne <DINÂMIA’CET-Iscte,
Centre for Socioeconomic and Territorial Studies, Instituto Universitário de
Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), Av. das Forças Armadas, 1649-026, Lisbon, Portugal>http://elea.unisa.it/xmlui/handle/10556/91582026-02-23T07:28:47Z2025-01-01T00:00:00ZTowards a Public Architectural History: Collective-Use Facilities and Community Engagement in Portugal and Spain
Agarez, Ricardo Costa < DINÂMIA’CET-Iscte,
Centre for Socioeconomic and Territorial Studies, Instituto Universitário de
Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), Av. das Forças Armadas, 1649-026, Lisbon, Portugal>; Pascoal, Ana Mehnert <DINÂMIA’CET-Iscte,
Centre for Socioeconomic and Territorial Studies, Instituto Universitário de
Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), Av. das Forças Armadas, 1649-026, Lisbon, Portugal>; Herrera-Pineda, Ivonne <DINÂMIA’CET-Iscte,
Centre for Socioeconomic and Territorial Studies, Instituto Universitário de
Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), Av. das Forças Armadas, 1649-026, Lisbon, Portugal>
The sustained use and reuse of existing buildings
is key in addressing social inequality and reinforcing sustainability and resilience in peripheral, disadvantaged communities of the so-called developed world. Collective-use
facilities built since the 1940s, the outcome of individual
and common efforts, carry decades of service to communities
and are repositories of both material and experiential values.
Knowing their history of production and use is essential in
reassessing their relevance for current and future needs: to be
effective, this knowledge must be appropriable and relatable,
co-created, and widely shared. This article discusses how such
premises are put to the test in Arquitectura Aqui, a research
and dissemination initiative underway in communities in
Portugal and Spain. Using different cases in both countries to
examine specific goals and methodologies, challenges and
results, we suggest that local engagement in co-researching
and co-narrating the past and present of buildings and their
role in collective life, in a participation and dissemination
platform, might contribute to putting into practice a public
architectural history of community buildings.
2025-01-01T00:00:00ZConservative Public History: Special Section IntroductionBauer, Caroline Silveira <History, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do
Sul, Porto Alegre, 90040-060, Brazil>Decker, Tunde <History, Osun State University, Osogbo, Nigeria>de Groot, Jerome <EACW, University of
Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PL, UK>Perry, Jimena <History, Iona University, New Rochelle, NY, USA>http://elea.unisa.it/xmlui/handle/10556/91572026-02-23T07:28:58Z2025-01-01T00:00:00ZConservative Public History: Special Section Introduction
Bauer, Caroline Silveira <History, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do
Sul, Porto Alegre, 90040-060, Brazil>; Decker, Tunde <History, Osun State University, Osogbo, Nigeria>; de Groot, Jerome <EACW, University of
Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PL, UK>; Perry, Jimena <History, Iona University, New Rochelle, NY, USA>
2025-01-01T00:00:00ZConservative Public History in IndiaSharma, Shalini <Senior Lecturer in South Asian
History, Keele University, Newcastle-under-Lyme, England>http://elea.unisa.it/xmlui/handle/10556/91562026-02-23T07:28:46Z2025-01-01T00:00:00ZConservative Public History in India
Sharma, Shalini <Senior Lecturer in South Asian
History, Keele University, Newcastle-under-Lyme, England>
This article explores the conservative turn in India’s public history, examining its shift from a pluralistic,
regionally grounded tradition to a centralized, ideologically
driven narrative under the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Since 2014, public history has been increasingly reframed
through the lens of Hindutva nationalism, marginalizing
minority voices and emphasizing a singular Hindu civilizational past. This “saffronization” is reflected in curriculum
reforms, state-sponsored monuments, and the commercialization of heritage. Through examples such as the Ram
Mandir, the Kashi Vishwanath Corridor, and corporatesponsored heritage sites, the paper shows how historical
memory is being curated to support a narrow ideological
project. Despite this, pluralist initiatives persist at the community level, including grassroots archives, urban heritage
walks, and NGO-supported preservation efforts. These offer
critical counter-narratives and underscore the ongoing
contestation over India’s past. The paper argues that public
history in India has become a terrain of political struggle,
where historical representation is deeply entwined with
questions of democracy, identity, and power.
2025-01-01T00:00:00Z