The University of Trieste hosted, as part of the activities of the international alliance Transform4Europe, a training week dedicated to the Common European Cultural Heritage. This event saw the participation of around forty students from nine universities involved in the project.

The T4EU Common European Heritage Week, held from Monday, February 24 to Friday, February 28, aimed to celebrate the cultural heritage of border areas and its capacity to inspire renewed and multicultural dialogue through the new generations.

The week's program included workshops and field visits for the participants, but also three days (Tuesday, February 25, Wednesday, February 26, and Thursday, February 27) dedicated to the international conference "Transborder Heritage: A Multidisciplinary Approach," which included seminars for the entire university community and three afternoon talks – in English with Italian translation – open to the public.

Anthropology, history, and architecture were the three fields of knowledge from which the complexities of the relationships between borders and cultural heritage were explored, addressing themes such as identity, memory, and cultural heritage in border regions, with contributions from three international experts: Alessandro Monsutti (anthropologist, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva), Borut Klabjan (historian, Science and Research Centre of Koper/Capodistria), and Neža Čebron Lipovec (expert in architectural heritage conservation, University of Primorska, Koper/Capodistria).

The talks, designed to stimulate critical thinking and creativity, covered topics such as cultural mobility, the challenges of collective memory, and the opportunities for integration offered by a heritage that goes far beyond mere historical legacy.

The students participating in the initiative, coming from universities in nine different European countries – Saarland University (Germany), Estonian Academy of Arts (Estonia), Universidade Católica Portuguesa (Portugal), University of Primorska (Slovenia), Jean Monnet University (France), University of Silesia in Katowice (Poland), Sofia University St. Kliment Ohridski (Bulgaria), Vytautas Magnus University in Kaunas (Lithuania), and the University of Trieste – concluded their training experience on Friday, February 28, with an initiative that pays homage to the spirit of GO2025, in which the capital of Gorizia and Nova Gorica are once again united in their role as the European Capital of Culture.

The students explored the history of the Italian-Slovenian border between Gorizia and Nova Gorica and visited three highly significant exhibitions: the Museum of the Border, which contextualizes the historical division between East and West in post-war Europe; the Smuggling Museum, which highlights the informal cross-border exchanges that characterized local life; and the Special Permit Museum (“Lasciapassare/Propustnica”), which testifies to the rigor of bureaucracy and the impact of movement restrictions.

PROGRAM OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

February 25, 5:00 PM – Sala Tessitori, Regione FVG, pz. Oberdan 5
Homo Sapiens, Homo Itinerans - Prof. Alessandro Monsutti
Migration has become a hot topic in both media and political debates, sparking strongly polarized public opinions. This talk will analyze different dimensions to debunk some of the dominant narratives: the long history of human mobility; the transition from colonial empires to nation-states; growing economic inequalities and demographic disparities; the persistence and fragmentation of conflicts. The migrant, and particularly the refugee, may be the political figure of our time, a symbol of the international and intra-national relations that define today's world.

Alessandro Monsutti is a professor at the Department of Anthropology and Sociology at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva. He was a Research Fellow at Yale University (2008-2010), a MacArthur Foundation grantee (2004-2006), Visiting Professor at the University of Vienna (2012, 2021) and Arizona State University (2014), and a Scholar-in-Residence at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna (2020). He has collaborated as a consultant for various international organizations and NGOs, such as the UNHCR, and conducted extensive field research in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and more recently in Western countries among Afghan refugees and migrants. He is the author and editor of numerous books, including War and Migration: Social Networks and Economic Strategies of the Hazaras of Afghanistan (2005) and Homo Itinerans: Towards a Global Ethnography of Afghanistan (2020).

February 26, 5:00 PM – Aula Magna, IUSLIT, Via Filzi 14
Cuius Regio Eius Natio. Building Memories, Shaping Histories, Negotiating Identifications - Prof. Borut Klabjan
The area of the current Italian-Slovenian border has undergone numerous regime changes during the 20th century. This is not something particularly new or peculiar to this area; however, the continuous flow of states, populations, and administrations has shaped not only the borders but also the hearts and minds of ordinary people. The impact on these local populations is not just a matter of regional history but represents a laboratory for the past, present, and future of Europe.

Borut Klabjan is a professor of History, specializing in the political and social history of Central and Southeastern Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries. He is currently the Principal Investigator of the ERC Advanced Grant Cold War Europe beyond Borders, which proposes a transnational history of cross-border practices in the Adriatic-Alpine area from World War II to the present, based at the Science and Research Centre of Koper, Slovenia. He has been a Fellow at Humboldt University in Berlin, the Institute for Southeast European Studies in Regensburg, the EUI in Florence, and LMU in Munich. His latest edited volume, Borderlands of Memory. Adriatic and Central European Perspectives, was published by Peter Lang Oxford, and his recent book The Fire that Embraced Europe. The Story of the Narodni dom in Trieste 1920-2020 was published in Slovenian (2021) and Italian (2023).

February 27, 5:00 PM – Aula Magna, IUSLIT, Via Filzi 14
Mirrorings and Entanglements in the Urban Spaces along Contested Borders - Prof. Neža Čebron Lipovec
Borders can be walls and barbed wire fences, but they can also represent bridges. In both cases, they are elements that are designed and constructed. Borders may appear as “ghost lines” on the map, fluid spaces, yet they can act as a point of reference, establishing visual dialogues even between elements of the built environment. In the Upper Adriatic region, many buildings "speak," telling stories of historical turmoil, aspirations, and appropriations. Sometimes they converse with each other, other times they shout across the border, ignoring each other. In other situations, these dialogues merge in the layers of a single building, becoming palimpsests waiting to be revealed, discovered, and heard again. This talk will analyze some of these sites, attempting to "listen" to them in order to understand the interaction between architecture and memory, and how people interact with them in an attempt to preserve them.

Neža Čebron Lipovec is an expert in architectural heritage studies and its conservation, working at the Department and Institute of Archaeology and Heritage at the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Primorska (Slovenia). Her research areas include the history and conservation of post-war architecture and critical studies of built heritage. She collaborates in numerous national and international research projects and is a member of the UNESCO Chair on Interpretation and Education for Integrated Heritage at the University of Primorska, as well as a member of the Management Board of the New European Bauhaus Academy Pioneer Hub for Sustainable Built Environments with Renewable Materials (NEBAP Hub).

PROGRAM FOR THE UNITS COMMUNITY

• February 25: Anthropology and Identities between Borders
• February 26: History and Memories in Border Areas
• February 27: Architecture and Transborder Spaces