CULTURAL MAPPING
An initiative of ATHINA Educational Network
Cultural Mapping, is an Action designed and performed by ATHINA, Educational Network – a Certified, Greek Network for Culture and Education – from March 2017. This innovatory Action of Greece, aims to promote Cultural Tourism, in a local and national level, by helping people and travelers in collecting cultural experiences and in exchanging their personal stories and views, through an interactive and experiental way, by using as well the tools offered by new technology.
The primary Aspiration of Cultural Mapping is Cultural and Environmental Heritage enhancement, along with showing the continuity (continuum) of history and reinforcing the participation and personal involvement of the travelers.
Cultural Mapping has already been implemented with great success in Crete, at the following area: Knossos – Way to the Birthplace of Zeus – Dictaean Cave, aiming to recapture Myth and Tradition, by bringing to light the history of the Cave together with the presentation of everyday life of Minoan in Knossos.
With the cooperation of the Cultural Technology Company, Clio Muse, Cultural Mapping uses an internet platform, where the user, by having access to our applications, has the opportunity to read and/or listen to small stories, having a guided, virtual tour through three dimensional pictures and getting all the necessary help from GPS.
All the above compose a unique tool of interactive experience, a vibrant memory of space and time, which enriches, through personal participation, the natural touring.
FIELDS OF ACTION
4 KEYS TO SUCCESS.
REINFORCING CIVIL SOCIETY
As Cultural Mapping wishes to extend its project, it tries to reveal to the travelers, details from history and tradition, hidden in the collective memory of society, through a vivant revival of the past. By giving access to a unique cultural experience, through the applications from its internet site, the Action gives the opportunity to every single one to share his/her personal story, a legend, a photo, a recipe, even a local product or an offered service. By this manner, the tours are enriched with true stories, which has been transmitted from one generation to another and are strongly connected as well, through personal experience, with the contemporary social reality of the specific area.
PLANNING OF CERTIFIED CULTURAL AND NATURAL TOURS
Due to the variety of stories and tours, Cultural Mapping aims for a thematical and chronological unification of places, designing tours in an interesting and interactive way for the traveler, as a simple and exciting story occurs. Likewise, adding all the stories, the Action creates a big picture about a single age of history and it connects it with the natural environment it took place. The strong environmental character of Cultural Mapping is showed through the certification of its paths as a united tour from the European Ramblers’ Association (ERA), as “Leading Quality Trails”.
STRENGHTENING SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP
Cultural Mapping aims to create job opportunities for all, through the exploitation of the tours. In this way, it promotes the branding of the area and its products and services as well, giving employment to people with new ideas about culture and tourism. At that level, ATHINA Educational Network supports the Action, by creating two new educational programs (diplomas) of specialization:
- Tour guide of outdoor activities
- Virtual tour guide
EDUCATING CHILDREN
Cultural Mapping has a strong educational character, as it often organizes educational and recreational school visits. Specifically, it aims to the active participation of students, as, for example, the salience of parts of Heraklion city of Crete, through students’ pictures and stories, which will be uploaded to the applications. Also, Cultural Mapping is planning to the near future, to establish the operation of summer schools with thematical activities of cultural and environmental nature. Education plays a vital role to the philosophy of Cultural Mapping.