Dancing with the cows: theorising hot heritage in Newmarket saleyards and abattoirs

Regarding urban regeneration and cultural heritage as continually renegotiated actualisations of assemblages of power, of exclusions and inclusions, I walk fantastically with the cows along the stock-route through what has become Lynch's Bridge and Kensington Banks in Melbourne, Australia, to problematise practices of branding with cultural heritage artefacts and values. The heritage 'preserved' in these schemes represents a highly sanitised, commodified image of the former saleyards and abattoirs which freezes into 'truth' mythical cultural entities. In contrast, Deleuzean thinking inspires an immanent conception of heritage; less traditional artefact and more relational spatial practice of past-present-future which stimulates visitors to think differently. 'Hot heritage' aims to challenge those who encounter heritage to question their values, attitudes and actions, to renegotiate cultural meaning through generative, sensational encounters which create an evental space for thinking otherwise. Cultural heritage, therefore, should not be regarded as a past-presence to be 'preserved', but as a calling-towards potentiality.