| Description |
The Heritage-sensitive Intellectual Property and Market Strategies (HIPAMS India) aims to investigate how developing ‘heritage-sensitive’ intellectual property protection strategies can give communities greater control over the commercialization of their heritage while contributing to its safeguarding and on-going viability.
Intangible cultural heritage (ICH) practices, such as craft, dance, musical performance, storytelling, and painting, give communities a sense of identity and belonging. The sale of products created by ICH practices can also create jobs and income. However, many communities in developing countries like India experience significant difficulty preventing the appropriation of their heritage by others, for example through mechanization of production methods. Conventional intellectual property (IP) rights, such as copyright, patents, and design protection, offer limited protection to the authors of original creations or new inventions that cannot easily be used to protect cultural expressions whose authors are unknown, and that have been passed down through the generations, changing and adapting to new contexts. HIPAMS India engages with three Indian ICH practices—Baul and Fakiri music, Chau dance, and Patachitra tradition to investigate how developing ‘heritage-sensitive’ IP protection strategies can give communities greater control over the commercialization of their heritage while contributing to its safeguarding and on-going viability.
HIPAMS India Operates under the Following Objectives
Assess the impact of Contact Base’s AFL strategies on socio-economic development and ICH safeguarding in the identified communities and on market outreach.
Co-create effective, replicable and scalable HIPAMS for use by these communities, based on this review process and research on similar case studies in other contexts.
Consider the impact of implementing these HIPAMS on socio-economic development and ICH safeguarding and market penetration.
Disseminate the findings in co-authored academic publications incorporating case studies from the project.
Translate research findings into policy briefs and workshop tools.
The project aims thereby to contribute to the sustainable development goals of Agenda 2030 by helping to build sustainable communities, protect and safeguard cultural heritage, enhance wellbeing, address income inequalities, promote economic empowerment (of women), and reduce poverty.
Visit the HIPAMS India’s website to learn about its activities and download their marketing strategies toolkit.
Photo : Purulia mask © HIPAMS |
