Gallus Glasgow banter, Folklore of the Fishwives, tales of Greenock in the Blitz, and fire festivals like Up Helly Aa are to be protected for the first time by world heritage officials.

It will mean the language of Chewin’ the Fat and Parliamo Glasgow could become rated by Unesco alongside the South American Tango, Chinese Calligraphy and Tibetan Opera.

Living history passed from generation to generation is to be identified and quantified as part of a massive task to protect Scotland’s “Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH)”.

A pilot scheme with a living website for people to record ideas for inclusion for Unesco ICH status has been set up by East Renfrewshire, Renfrewshire and Inverclyde councils with a team from Napier University, Edinburgh.

By 2011, the whole of Scotland will be able to take part and debate ICH hopefuls co-ordinated by each local authority for scrutiny by Unesco online at a dedicated website page based on Wikipedia.

Individuals will first submit a form with an idea before it reaches the online inventory, but community groups may be able to put contenders directly on the website.

Benefits of ICH status include future Unesco grants and lottery funding to ensure the survival of such living traditions, ranging from oral expression to craftsmanship, and the performing arts to social practices and rituals.

Dr Linda Gunn, of Napier University, said the possibilities were vast, “whether sayings and expressions fishermen use in Aberdeen, beliefs held about forecasting the weather in Tarbert, or costumes worn for taking part in Sikh weddings in Scotland”.

Once established local authorities will be able to use the resource of a database of Scotland’s Intangible Cultural Heritage for education and to help keep the traditions alive, possible in adult literacy classes and through libraries and museums.

Michael Russell, Culture Minister, backed the move. He said: “Much of Scotland’s rich cultural heritage is not easy to define or categorise, it goes beyond what we can see and touch in museums.

“From peat cutting on Yell to the boys’ ba’ game in Jedburgh, we have a wealth of living traditions across the country and I welcome this drive to record, celebrate and share our intangible cultural assets with future generations.”

The UK Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) gave a record grant of £363,485 to the research team to undertake the project of recording and preserving those aspects of Scotland’s culture that cannot necessarily be housed in museums forward.

The award – a sum significantly larger than any other previous Knowledge Transfer Fellowship awarded by the AHRC – will allow the project to be rolled out nationally and enable Napier’s research team to begin setting up the ICH in Scotland online inventory.

Alison McCleery, knowledge transfer fellow and director of research at Napier underlined that while the award puts Napier at the forefront of a national initiative, the importance of the project has a much wider significance for the people of Scotland.

She said: “The information we will record is important because it provides people with a sense of identity and continuity”.

Mary Montague, East Renfrewshire community services convener, said many aspects of social history are often overlooked.

She said: “Cultural heritage is not all about big events and large buildings but much more about preserving the customs and culture of particular areas.

“By being part of the project we can capture aspects of that cultural heritage in a more cost-effective way by sharing expertise and resources across the councils.

“East Renfrewshire for example, has the heritage of Barrhead, one of the first industrial towns in Scotland, Renfrewshire has the Paisley mills and Inverclyde shipbuilding and sugar, all part of industrial heritage and all capable of being recorded across the council area in terms of personal memories, rather than by using separate teams.

“This is sharing services in an area which might not be frontline, but sharing a service like this makes for economies of scale and the preservation of much that might otherwise be lost for ever, in many cases, the living history which explains the current condition of parts of our areas, becomes economically practical.”

Living history

Set up in 2003, Unesco’s Intangible Cultural Heritage list has around 200 protected traditions. Here are some of the highlights:

The Tango

THE Argentinian and Uruguayan tradition of the Tango was developed by the urban lower classes in Buenos Aires and Monte-video in the River Plate basin. Among this mix of European immigrants to the region, descendants of African slaves and the natives of the region known as criollos, a wide range of customs, beliefs and rituals were merged and transformed into a distinctive cultural identity.

Day of the Dead

AS practised by indigenous communities in Mexico, el Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) commemorates the transitory return to Earth of deceased relatives and loved ones.

Chinese Calligraphy

THIS eastern artform has always been more than simply a tool for communication, incorporating as it does the element of artistry for which the practice is still valued in an age of ballpoint pens and computers. Indeed, calligraphy is no longer the basic tool of intellectuals and officials but has become the preserve of professional artisans and amateur enthusiasts.

Vimbuza Healing Dance

A healing dance popular among the Tumbuka people living in northern Malawi, Vimbuza is an important manifestation of the ng’oma, a healing tradition found throughout Bantu-speaking Africa. Ng’oma, meaning “drums of affliction”, carries considerable historical depth and despite various suppression attempts remains a fundamental part of indigenous healthcare systems.