Are we ready to prioritise cultural heritage over commercial interest? It is a question of values. More specifically – it is a matter of deciding how to resolve a clash between an intrinsic and instrumental value. Pondering this may reveal the values we live by, perhaps without fully recognising them. In today’s post, I share an example of this.
A short documentary titled “The People Will Always Be There” explores a very specific conflict of values. There is a place, a canyon running some 40 miles in Utah, USA, with a misleading name: Nine Mile Canyon. It has been called ‘the world’s longest gallery’ due to roughly 10,000 Native American petroglyphs and pictographs spread across approximately 1,000 distinct sites. However, this gallery is under threat of the consequences of commercial interest. A proposed local road improvement for the purpose of nearby natural gas development means a lot more traffic and a lot more dust covering and eroding the centuries-old images. Which values will win? And, equally important, whose take on what constitutes sufficient intrinsic value will sway the decision?
“The film’s narrator, the local Zuni elder and ancestral farmer Jim Enote, argues that these images – sacred to local Native Americans, and part of the shared cultural heritage of all of humanity – deserve the same respect and reverence accorded to non-Native holy sites, burial grounds and celebrated artworks.”
Psyche article on the video
Link to the documentary: The People Will Always Be There.
Keeping up the “Spreading the Word” tradition, I hope to share an insightful and mind-broadening article, podcast episode or video every weekend. Humans have always turned and returned to storytelling to find meaning. My end-of-week “Spreading the Word” posts are an online sharing of meaningful stories.
keep exploring and storytelling!
P.S. Thank you for visiting me here on the humanfactor.blog! If you enjoyed this post and are interested in more philosophical content, I invite you to explore the blog, leave a comment, like, and subscribe to get notified of new posts.
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