Cultural heritage is material – tangible and intangible – that signifies a culture’s history or legacy. It has become a venue for contestation, ranging in scale from protesting to violently claimed and destroyed. But who defines what is to be preserved and what is to be erased? As cultural heritage becomes increasingly significant across the world, the number of issues for critical analysis and, hopefully, mediation, arise. The issue stems from various groups: religious, ethnic, national, political, and others come together to claim, appropriate, use, exclude, or erase markers and manifestations of their own and others’ cultural heritage as a means for asserting, defending, or denying critical claims to power, land, and legitimacy. Can cultural heritage be well managed and promoted while at the same time kept within parameters so as to diminish contestation? The cases herein rage from Greece, Spain, Egypt, the UK, Syria, Zimbabwe, Italy, the Balkans, Bénin, and Central America.

Selected and arranged by the authors themselves, and featuring an introduction by Jarvis Cocker, Side by Side presents the lyrics, poems, writings and drawings of innovative musician Robert Wyatt and his creative partner, English painter and songwriter Alfie Benge. As a founding member of influential English rock bands Soft Machine and Matching Mole, and with a solo career which has lasted for over forty years and seen him collaborate with a diverse range of artists including Bjork, Brian Eno, Carla Bley, Paul Weller and David Gilmour, his own music remains unclassifiably personal. Alfie Benge is a visual artist, songwriter and pioneering music manager, having managed Robert's career for fifty years. She is also married to Robert. Since 1982 they have collaborated on many of Robert's most well-known songs. This unique volume celebrates one of the most enduring creative partnerships of the last half-century. 'Taken together Alfie & Robert's lyrics combine to create a humanist world-view that is at once global & particular. Take it from me: that's no mean feat.' Jarvis Cocker 'English music has produced some fascinating personalities, but few are as unusual as Robert Wyatt.' Brian Eno 'A highly idiosyncratic and intuitively melodic maverick' BBC Music