Landscape Narration and Digitization between Preservation and Regeneration in Fragile Areas. The Case of the Italian Western Alps

Abstract

During the last decades, cultural heritage digitization processes have assumed a central role in documenting, communi­cating, and enhancing the cultural land­scape. Beyond the development of cata­logues, Cultural Heritage GIS, and web maps, administrations, associations, pri­vate companies, and spontaneous groups of citizens created innovative landscape narrations to promote their places. In the same direction, the Italian policy on pe­ripheral areas, Strategia Nazionale per le Aree Interne (SNAI), recognize landscape as a latent common capital that, if prop­erly managed, could play a relevant role in the reactivation and regeneration of mar­ginal municipalities. With a focus on the nine experimental areas identified by SNAI in the Western Alps, the study analyses the digitization processes and the landscape narrations available online. Moreover, the paper deepens the top-down and bottom-up ap­proaches, the involvement of local stake­holders, the opportunities to attract ex­ternal resources with the aim to learn the possible links between ICTs, tourism, and the regeneration of fragile landscapes.

Keywords

• non-outstanding cultural landscapes
• landscape storytelling
• territorial fragilities
• fragile landscapes
• icts for landscape