Intangible and tangible landscapes: an anthropological perspective based on a South African case study

The relationship between landscape and culture, or landscape and memory,represents a developing discourse in anthropological and other cross-disciplinary fields. During the late nineties, tangible and intangible aspects of culture became more prominent in anthropological discussions. The current a global movement towards a unified vision of landscape focuses on the integration of culture and nature and incorporates the conservation of the identities of people and places.Within the development industry in South Africa, the concept and realities concerning the preservation of intangible heritage are still misunderstood, with conservation policies largely ignoring the role of memory and meaning. Formal training as a landscape architect focussed the researcher on the physical and spatial aspects of landscape. Subsequent training in the anthropological field added a unique dimension to the studies of landscape. Through qualitative anthropological fieldwork methods it became possible to access its intangible aspects. These intangible values of meaning, memory, lived experience and attachment, in relation to people\&s connection to locality and landscape, were traced back to the tangible fabric of place. n this paper, the researcher will attempt to illustrate with a case study the complexity of interpreting intangible landscape and its relation to the tangible fabric, specifically focussing on the role of memory.