Gerson, Stéphane
An Impossible Local Heritage: Nostradamus in Salon-de-Provence (1980–1999)
- 2013.
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This paper considers the case of Michel de Nostradamus and Salon-de-Provence at the end of the 20th century. It examines the symbolic, economic, and memory relations that an average-sized town maintains with a local figure, whose stigmatizing connotations are at variance with the notions of modernity or tradition championed by local heritage entrepreneurs. The convergence or divergence between the local and the national or international forces are blurred by interlacing measures: rehabilitation combining reinvention and effacement, borrowings and reappropriations, uncertain refusals and re-routings. The paper looks at one museum in particular, as well as at tourism, cultural and neighborhood associations, the press, and annual historical re-enactments.