This module focuses on the question of how and why people need, create and use cultural heritage. Various factors will be examined including social, political and economic ones, with reference to examples of cultural heritage in Japan. Two characteristics of cultural heritage are stressed in particular: heritage unites and divides people. Stressing the close link between cultural heritage, memory and identity, the module aims to reveal how cultural heritage has been and is used for the making of community, nation and empire, both in global and Japanese contexts.