SINGAPORE - In a bid to better engage young people in Singapore’s heritage sector, the National Heritage Board (NHB) is putting together a new blueprint with the help of youth.
The first Youth Heritage Blueprint will be launched by June to July 2024, and will make recommendations across five focus areas: museum programming, physical outreach touchpoints and digital content, cultural access and participation of youth in the heritage sector, youth-catered publicity strategies, and collaborative heritage projects with youth.
The NHB also wants to capture insights and attitudes on heritage through an online youth survey, set to launch between July and August 2023.
There will also be focus group discussions from September to December to further engage with youth on key themes.
This initiative will be led by the Youth Panel, which was established in 2021 under the initial Our SG Heritage Plan. The panel comprises a 31-strong team of students, heritage society representatives from various institutions of higher learning and working adults.
The blueprint is one of the highlights of Our SG Heritage Plan 2.0, which was unveiled on Friday to chart the way for Singapore’s heritage and museum sector over the next five years.
Speaking at the launch, Minister for Culture, Community and Youth Edwin Tong said: “Our youth are a big part of our community and will represent the generation that will lead the future stewardship of our heritage. The blueprint will provide guidance for NHB on how to strengthen and sustain youth involvement in the heritage sector.”
Mr Kai Alexandre Timen van Putten, 19, has been serving as the co-lead of the access and participation subcommittee on the Youth Panel since January. Having grown up experiencing the Dutch heritage on his father’s side, and Peranakan and Hokkien-Chinese influence from his mother, he said his story is one of many that make up the Singaporean melting pot.
As an arts management student at the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts, it was his school that recommended he join the Youth Panel.
He said: “It is important for us to know our background because it ultimately influences future generations. Our goal (as the Youth Panel) is to cast a wide net to promote awareness and understanding of not just their unique heritage, but of other people’s as well.”
For Ms Nur Ashikin Muhamad Ali, 26, heritage has always been a key interest. With a background in arts management at Lasalle College of the Arts, she serves as the lead for physical touchpoints and digital content, which looks at ways of digitalising interactions with heritage beyond physical outreach programmes to better appeal to youth.
Regarding her hopes for the blueprint, she said: “A lot of people have the perception that heritage is quite archaic, for youth especially. But what I want to find out is how we can change this perception into something that relates to who we are today, and align old values with the current values of today.”
Correction note: An earlier version of the story misspelled the name of Youth Panel member Kai Alexandre Timen van Putten. This has been corrected. We are sorry for the error.
