Haunting Heritage in an Enchanted Land

This article addresses the functions and meanings of Second World War German material heritage in northern Finland from a haunting perspective and in terms of magical thinking. While archaeologists and heritage professionals have primarily been interested in the historical information that Second Wo...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of Contemporary Archaeology
Main Author: Herva, Vesa-Pekka
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:unknown
Published: Equinox Publishing 2015
Subjects:
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1558/jca.v1i2.18639
https://journal.equinoxpub.com/JCA/article/download/10549/12575
Description
Summary:This article addresses the functions and meanings of Second World War German material heritage in northern Finland from a haunting perspective and in terms of magical thinking. While archaeologists and heritage professionals have primarily been interested in the historical information that Second World War sites and military material culture may contain, this article explores how encounters and engagements with Second World War materialities in the northern wilderness of Lapland can be considered to affect people and manipulate their perceptions, awareness and understanding of the surrounding world. Second World War sites and matériel may be taken to promote a kind of magical consciousness which enables a degree of restructuring of relationships between the self and world and the past and present.