Title: Building virtual cultural heritage environments: the embodied mind at the core of the learning processes

Authors: Elena Bonini

Addresses: Technology and Management of Cultural Heritage, IMT – Lucca Institute for Advanced Studies, Italy

Abstract: This paper presents some theoretical guidelines for the development of virtual cultural heritage environments. Before designing collaborative technological systems, such as virtual communities, it is necessary to develop an epistemological approach to virtual |musealisation|. In other words, it is necessary to take into account the learning processes of human mind. According to the enaction paradigm, which claims that cognition enacts when a human being acts in an environment, learning is a process based on action. Thus cognition is seen as embodied and embedded in the context it experiences. A virtual environment for cultural heritage is feasible and sustainable not only if it respects the interpretative processes of the cultural heritage in itself, but also if it enhances learning and this cooperative interpretation through a suitable system design.

Keywords: virtual environments; cognition; enaction; embodiment; cultural heritage; learning; embodied mind; virtual reality; cultural transmission; digital culture.

DOI: 10.1504/IJDCET.2008.021402

International Journal of Digital Culture and Electronic Tourism, 2008 Vol.1 No.2/3, pp.113 - 125

Published online: 24 Nov 2008 *

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