Luiz Oosterbeek

Luiz Oosterbeek, born the 24th August 1960 in Ede (Netherlands), with Portuguese nationality, graduated in History (Lisbon 1982), having started his academic activity as an archaeologist in 1982. He worked mainly on the mechanisms of spread of agro-pastoralism in Iberia, the topic of his PhD research in Archaeology (London 1994, Oporto 1995). Acting as a lecturer and a museum director, he has conducted research in the fields of archaeology, heritage and landscape management in Portugal, Africa and Southern America since 1983. For these activities he has received prizes and awards from the European Commission, the Brazilian Lawyers Bar, the Portuguese Ministry of Culture, the Gulbenkian Foundation, the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology and several private sponsors.
He is a Professor at the Polytechnic Institute of Tomar, coordinator of Master and PhD Erasmus Mundus programmes in quaternary and prehistory, invited Professor of the Universities of Córdoba (Spain) and Ferrara (Italy), member of the scientific council of the Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle (France). He has been a guest professor in over 40 universities from 20 countries in Europe and Brazil, and is a member of several NGOs in the field of cultural and environmental heritage.
Luiz Oosterbeek is the Secretary General of the International Council for Philosophy and Human Sciences since October 2014. He is also the Secretary General of the International Union of Prehistoric and Protohistoric Sciences, since September 2006, and a member of the German Institute of Archaeology, of the Scientific Committee of the European University Centre for Cultural Heritage (Ravello, Italy) and an advisor of the Taihu World Cultural Forum (China), as well as member of several other academic bodies. He is president of the Instituto Terra e Memória (Portugal), a research and development structure based in Mação, with ongoing projects in archaeology, heritage management and landscape management in various countries in Europe, Africa and Southern America. As a former vice-manager of the Iberianamerican Program on Science and Technology, he assessed and monitored several research projects on Science and Society. From 1994, on several occasions he served as academic Expert for the European Commission and the European Training Foundation, in programmes such as Erasmus, Erasmus Mundus, Tempus, Culture and Marie-Curie. He has been promotor of the Socrates programme (1995-1006) and Erasmus Ambassador (2012).
Luiz Oosterbeek is the author of over 300 papers and 50 books, mostly on the origins of agro-pastoralism, rock art, landscape management and heritage studies (management, tourism and law). He is Director of the Museum of Prehistoric Art in Mação, Portugal (which holds the Vice-Presidency of the Association CARP for the Council of Europe Rock Art Itinerary), Vice-President of HERITY International in Italy and one of the founders of the Portuguese Association for Intangible Heritage. He is Principal Investigator of the Quaternary and Prehistory group of the Geosciences Centre of Coimbra University. Currently he is a member of the Scientific Commission and the leading task force of the International Year for Global Understanding, approved by UNESCO General Assembly in 2013. He is also involved in the preparation, for 2017, of the World Conference of the Humanities (organised by UNESCO, CIPSH and LIEGETOGETHER).