Approaching Salt-working: From Heritage to Experiential Environmental Wisdom

Between March 14 and 19, 2025, the 13th It’s About People conference, organized by Alma Mater Europaea University, was held in Maribor. The theme of the conference was Social and Technological Resilience for Health and Sustainable Development. On March 19, 2025, an online scientific panel entitled “Approaching Salt-working: From Heritage to Experiential Environmental Wisdom” was held, moderated by Dr. Maja Bjelica (ZRS Koper). Five contributions were presented: 1. Heritagization of the Sečovlje saltern and the salt making in the municipality of Piran (Primož Pipan; ZRC SAZU), 2. Salt-working as environmental cohabitation: an experiential ecoethnography (Maja Bjelica; ZRS Koper), 3. The heritage of salt production: National identities and the dividing lines between natural and cultural heritage (Daša Ličen, ZRC SAZU), 4. Coexistence as a “state of mind”: legal norms, their implementation and the practice of saltmaking (Jerneja Penca and Matjaž Klun, ZRS Koper), 5. The Elemental Poetics and Phenomenology of Salt and Salt-making (Petri Berndtson, ZRS Koper).

The scholarly panel was prepared in the framework of the basic research project ARIS J6-50196, financed by the Slovenian Research and Innovation Agency (ARIS).