01426nas a2200145   4500000000100000000000100001008004100002100002100043245010100064856006200165300001000227490000700237520102200244022001401266                                       d1 aKatherine Fisher00aMichèle Valerie Cloonan. The Monumental Challenge of Preservation: The Past in a Volatile World  uhttps://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/extart?codigo=6960608  a49-510 v203 aMichèle Cloonan’s wide-ranging study of cultural heritage preservation opens with the premise that preservation is an unavoidably complex endeavor. Collaborative and interdisciplinary approaches are needed to confront threats to heritage, whether from war and genocide, resource limitations, business interests, or apathy. Cloonan—current professor and dean emerita at the Simmons School of Library and Information Science, and a former conservator, preservation librarian, and special collections curator—takes an expansive view of monuments, including in her definition not only physical edifices but also texts, artworks, collections, natural landscapes, and intangible heritage. In doing so, she emphasizes the highly contextual nature of preservation, which has social, historical, and political valences. These influences, along with legal, technological, and financial factors, shape understandings of what constitutes preservation and what can and should be preserved in any given set of circumstances.  a1529-6407