Directorate of Arts & Letters
The Directorate of Arts & Letters is in charge of all kinds of:
- Arts
- Plastic arts
- Crafts
- Folk traditions
- Literature
- Intellectual yield
- Theater
- Performing arts
Tasks of the Directorate of Arts & Letters
- Preserving the national traditional plastic art and disseminating plastic art culture and promoting innovation in its different fields.
- Preserving arts, crafts and folk traditions including those pertaining to traditional architectural, publicizing them and ensuring their dissemination.
- Preserving all kinds of literary works and intellectual yield, encouraging production in the literary and intellectual fields, and promoting the spread of public libraries.
- Promoting the theatrical movement and performing arts, and spreading theatrical culture and performance arts through all segments of society.
Intangible Cultural Heritage
The General Conference of the UNESCO adopts on 17/10/2003 the Convention on the safeguarding of intangible cultural heritage, and Lebanon signed the convention under Law No. 720 Dated 15/5/2006
According to this Convention ,the intangible cultural heritage is manifested particularly in the following domains:
- Oral traditions and expressions, including language as a vehicle of the expression of the intangible cultural heritage
- Performing arts and traditions
- Social practices, rituals and festive events
- Knowledge and practices concerning nature and the universe
- Traditional craftsmanship
In the framework of the program of the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership, with funding from the European Union, Lebanon signed in 2009, along with three other Arab countries, a partnership agreement with the UNESCO for three years, in order to assist States Parties to implement the provisions of the above mentioned Convention, by conducting studies on the status of intangible cultural Heritage and working on the documentation and the registration of some elements of this heritage. In parallel, the Ministry of culture conducted studies and researches and identified some intangible cultural heritage elements in order to register them on national lists and then proposed the nomination of “Al-Zagal” (a declaimed or sung form of poetry) to the UNESCO representative list of intangible cultural heritage.
In fact, the UNESCO included “AL-Zagal” on the representative list of intangible cultural heritage on November 27, 2014.
