The Usefulness of the Johari Window for the Cultural Heritage Planning Process

The standard heritage planning process follows the trajectory of identification, nomination, evaluation, listing and protection. The epistemology of the nominations and valuations is only rarely, if ever, examined. The Johari window was developed by the psychologists Joseph Luft and Harrington Ingham as a tool to examine group dynamics, in particular an individual's position in, and their relationship and interactions with others in a group. This paper examines the usefulness of the Johari window for the Cultural Heritage Planning Process. Based on the interrelationship of what oneself and others know about each other and are prepared to divulge, the Johari window allows to conceptualize overlapping levels of knowledge and ownership within five newly defined epistemological domains. It also serves as an analytical tool to systematically query the heritage universe of a community and thereby examine the composition and comprehensiveness of heritage registers as well as nominations that have been put forward.