What to Save and Why

What to Save and Why (2024) explores how we decide what artifacts, heritage, and landscapes to preserve, especially in the face of historical injustice and shifting values. It challenges conventional assumptions about value, memory, and moral responsibility, advocating for a more philosophical approach to cultural preservation. 

• Anyone interested in the ethics of conservation
• Cultural policymakers
• Philosophy students studying aesthetics and the arts

Erich Hatala Matthes, Ph.D., is a professor of philosophy at Wellesley College, specializing in the aesthetics, ethics, and politics of art, cultural heritage, and the environment. His first book, Drawing the Line, grappled with the question of engaging with the work of immoral artists. Hatala Matthes received the American Philosophical Association’s 2018 Public Philosophy Op-Ed prize.