FRJB25 CAE HERITAGE Europe's cultural heritage

The students were divided into 8 groups of different nationalities. They were first reminded that the common heritage of the Member States was enshrined in the Treaty of Lisbon, which mentions ‘Europe's cultural, religious and humanist heritage’ as a source of inspiration for European integration (preamble to the Treaty on European Union), that Europe's cultural heritage is a rich and varied mosaic of cultural and creative expression, and that, while policy in this area is primarily the responsibility of the Member States and regional and local authorities, the European Union is committed to preserving and enhancing Europe's cultural heritage through a number of actions and programmes.

Each group was then asked to present cultural expressions from the countries in each group that celebrate a common value. The instructions they were given were as follows : 

1- Each group first chose a European value that would be common to all the forms of expression they would select.

References : Treaty on European Union, Article 2 : ‘The Union is founded on the values of respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities. These values are common to the Member States in a society characterised by pluralism, non-discrimination, tolerance, justice, solidarity and equality between women and men’; list of Olympic and European values in the RESPECTOL project

2- They were then given a list of cultural expressions : monuments, museums, myths, tales or legends, works of art, music or songs, films, games, gastronomic traditions. 

Each group had to select 2 examples of each cultural expression (from 2 different countries in the group) and explain how they are representative of the common European value.

Each group created a poster made up of post-its showing examples of each cultural expression (16 examples) and presented it to the other groups.