Paper short abstract:

This paper aims to analyse the relationship between institutionalised heritage and local memories through the ethnographic study of two neighbourhoods of Valencia (Spain), focusing on the ethical and political struggle to define urban narratives and local identities.

Paper long abstract:

This paper focuses on the multiple uses of the past that take place on the neighbourhood scale, either by local institutions who seek to legitimise certain urban narratives, either by urban actors who strive to give meaning to the territories they inhabit. To do this, we begin by drawing a conceptual framework around the notions of heritage, memory, space and identity. Secondly, we go through the socio-historical development of two neighbourhoods of Valencia, analysing what aspects of the past are highlighted or hidden in the official narrative and reflecting on the main heritage items that are used to recall these particular memories. Thirdly, we look at how local actors relate with this institutionalised heritage and the strategies they deploy to negotiate the established narrative and the local identity. Precisely, we will analyse a Facebook page used to share memories from one of these neighbourhoods and a local festivity in which a historical workers riot is represented and commemorated. On the basis of these two cases, we conclude reflecting on the tension between global and particularist discourses that lies behind the definition of heritage and local identities.