A holistic approach to the relationship between culture and nature in cultural landscape, Case study of Bam, Iran

The concept of cultural landscape, as the product of the interaction between culture and micro-ecosystem over the passage of time, have been formed with the aim of bridging the gap between the concept of culture and nature in modern atomistic perspective and re-linking these two concepts in an approach called "holistic" in this paper. Over the passage of time, this concept attracted the special attention of conservation organizations as a form of human cultural heritage. However, the boundaries between the natural and cultural landscapes deriving from atomistic viewpoint still exists. The purpose of this paper is to examine the challenges of making these boundaries and develop a holistic model for recognition and classification of cultural landscapes based on the proportion of culture and nature of cultural landscapes. The key question is what elements are included in the explanation of culture and nature proportion in cultural landscape and how the logical relationships between them can be explained. Given the general approach of the paper that is making theory and analytical model, the qualitative research method is used; and case study is applied in order to explain the model resulted from qualitative analysis. In this paper, an analytical model is presented in order to recognize and classify cultural landscapes based on the proportion of culture and nature. This model suggests that the recognition of a cultural landscape is subject to the identification of three main factors shaping each cultural landscape, including “the human intervention in nature”, “the type of this intervention regarding being tangible or intangible”, and “the time of formation and existence continuity of that landscape”. Comprehensive coverage of the different types of cultural landscapes and identification of the main factors shaping each cultural landscape; as well as solving the problem of demarcation of cultural and natural landscapes can be mentioned as the results of this analytical model.
Following that, using the proposed model, the interaction of man and nature in the urban landscape of Bam in three scales of small (garden-house), medium (garden-alley), and large (garden- city) are identified and analyzed. Secondary outcome is revealing the importance of “the cause of interventions” in identification of cultural landscapes; so that the main interventions shaping the cultural landscape of Bam are divided into three groups of tangible interventions based on economy, housing and social relations. The cause of interventions, in addition to helping Bam Cultural Landscape recognition, reveals the importance of economy in the formation and continuity of cultural landscape, and defines the type and extent of man's relationship with nature and social relations of the city residents. This importance is such that the sustainability of life in the city of Bam without the balance of economic cycle based on horticulture and cultivation of palm trees seems impossible. By explaining the proposed analytical model of this research in “Bam Cultural Landscape”, the efficiency of the model holism in covering the identification and analysis of cultural landscapes in different contexts and scales can be concluded.