Intangible Cultural Heritage

Smithsonian Initiatives

Through the Sharing Knowledge project, the uses and meanings of cultural heritage objects come to life in the words of Alaskan Native experts

Discovery Theater

Discovery Theater has been presenting children with live educational performances for more than 35 years

Smithsonian Folklife Festival

The Smithsonian Folklife Festival is an international celebration of living cultural heritage that takes place on the National Mall of the United States

Oral History

Smithsonian archives contain oral histories of artists, performers, ethnographers, staff, and others

Smithsonian Collections

Smithsonian Collections represents documented intangible cultural heritage in addition to tangible assets and material collections

Smithsonian Folkways Recordings

Smithsonian Folkways Recordings supports cultural diversity through the documentation, preservation, and dissemination of sound

Recovering Voices

Recovering Voices documents and sustains the world’s endangered languages

Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra

Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra presents and perpetuates the legacy of jazz

Smithsonian Music

Smithsonian Music increases access to the institution’s vast music resources

Project bibliography

Preliminary project bibliography on intangible cultural heritage in museum contexts (Download)

Smithsonian publications

Multimedia

Policy

Books

Worlds of Sound: The Story of Smithsonian Folkways by Richard Carlin
Living Our Cultures, Sharing Our Heritage: The First Peoples of Alaska by Aron Crowell
Latin Jazz: La Combinación Perfecta by Raul Fernandez
Faces of Salsa: A Spoken History of the Music by Leonardo Padura Fuentes
Labor’s Troubador by Joe Glazer
Making People's Music: Moe Asch and Folkways Records by Peter Goldsmith
Lox, Stocks, and Backstage Broadway: Iconic Trades of New York City by Nancy Groce
This Land is Your Land by Woody Guthrie and Kathy Jakobsen
Divine Utterances: The Performance of Afro-Cuban Santeria by Katherine J. Hagedorn
Mammals of Ungava and Labrador: The 1882-1884 Fieldnotes of Lucien M. Turner together with Inuit and Innu Knowledge edited by Scott A. Heyes and Kristofer M. Helgen
The Storage Box of Tradition: Kwakiutl Art, Anthropologists, and Museums, 1881-1981 by Ira Jacknis
Reflections of a Culture Broker: The View from the Smithsonian by Richard Kurin
Smithsonian Folklife Festival: Culture of, by, and for the People by Richard Kurin
Raramuri Souls: Knowledge and Social Process in Northern Mexico by William L. Merrill
We'll Understand It Better By and By: Pioneering African American Gospel Composers by Bernice Johnson Reagon
Nashville’s Lower Broad: The Street That Music Made featuring Bill Rouda, Lucinda Williams, and David Eason
Music in the Mind: The Concepts of Music and Musician in Afghanistan by Hiromi Lorraine Sakata
Talking Feet by Mike Seeger
Puro Conjunto: An Album in Words & Pictures by Juan Tejada and Avelardo Valdez

Articles

Intangible Cultural Heritage: An International Dialogue, Smithsonian Institution symposium proceedings, June 30, 2014
Theorizing Cultural Heritage publications