On 10–11 October 2025, an international workshop titled “Shared Cultural Heritage: Multi-layered Places of Remembrance in the Urban Space” was organized under the auspices of the Department of Culture and Communication Sciences, Faculty of Culture and Social Sciences, Turkish-German University (TGU), in cooperation with the German Archaeological Institute (DAI, Istanbul) and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).
During the two-day workshop, the themes of recognizing, preserving, and communicating multi-layered cultural heritage in urban space were addressed from an interdisciplinary perspective. The working language of the event was English, and the program featured academics and researchers from Türkiye, Germany, Palestine, and Switzerland.
The opening speeches were delivered by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Süreyya İlkılıç, Head of the Department of Culture and Communication Sciences at TGU, Dr. Moritz Kinzel, Deputy Director of the Istanbul Branch of the German Archaeological Institute, and Dr. Detlev Quintern, under the moderation of Res. Assist. Betül İset, who also served as the workshop moderator.
Throughout the program, speakers delivered presentations on cultural heritage preservation, urban memory, the role of digital archives, and shared sites of remembrance in Türkiye and various regions of the world. The first day of the workshop concluded with a visit to the Shoe Factory Museum at Beykoz Kundura. This field trip provided participants with the opportunity to make on-site observations regarding Türkiye’s social and industrial heritage.
On the second day, the workshop continued with panel sessions and field trips held at the Istanbul Branch of the German Archaeological Institute. Through a visit to the Zeyrek district, participants had the opportunity to experience Istanbul’s multi-layered cultural fabric firsthand. In the later sessions of the day, international presentations addressed topics such as digital heritage, archives, the Gaza Archaeological Museum, and the symbolic significance of Bethlehem.
The workshop provided a productive platform for interdisciplinary discussions on how cultural heritage can be communicated in the public sphere, making a significant contribution to the shaping of scholarly foundations for future approaches to museology and heritage conservation.
