Critical Heritage and Participatory Discourse in the UAE

Abstract

Decolonization is not imagined in the same way around the world. Indeed, the recognition that colonization did not happen in a similar fashion in a global context is key to envisioning futures that free the binds of colonial rule and neocolonialism. A desire to decolonize requires close attention to these specific histories, and the manners by which populations of people in the same place were impacted differently. Uniting these varied experiences are strategies and tactics to undo the processes of colonialism and imperialism. At its core, however, any such endeavor must have epistemic clarity. The history that anchors decoloniality is not only one of future orientation, but rather a constant desire to have some clarity on past events, or maybe even to claim them as reparative. It is in those spaces that decoloniality enters critical heritage discourses. This article focuses on the past and the present moment of negotiation and participation in the two Emirates, Sharjah and Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Design, in this context, informs critical heritage discourse and provides a platform for participatory discursive action – not in the service of democratic idealisms, but rather as a threshold at which decolonization occurs and problematizes contemporary inequity.

Keywords:

• decolonizing design
• critical heritage
• UAE
• participatory design
• critical design
• Dubai
• Sharjah

Notes

1. I find decolonizing methods in the UAE to be far more precarious and precise, as compared to work that I have done in India (see Rizvi 2006, 2008). India, being a democratic post-colony, allows and expects a different form of interaction, and presumes civic participation as part of the decolonial method. The UAE, being an ethnocratic federation that is primarily based on patronage, cannot and should not have the same presumptions of what decolonization might look like because the framework within which action unfolds is distinct.

2. It is interesting to think through how and when the Cafeteria enters into the realm of critical heritage discourse and aesthetics. One of the first productions of it can be seen in Lantian Xie’s piece, Woodland Fern No. 4. Curator Murtaza Vali (2015) says the piece “is a modest monument to this unheralded space of local multiculturalism, a 1:1 recreation of an accent wall found at Xie’s neighborhood Eat & Drink Cafeteria, its enigmatic title a reference to the wall’s exact shade of green. Extracted from its original architecture and imported into the gallery, the wall becomes a multivalent symbol: a monochrome mural, a Chinese spirit wall, and a chroma key green screen, a mutable background that, like the cafeteria that inspired it, can comfortably accommodate the whole world.”

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Uzma Z. Rizvi

Uzma Z. Rizvi is Associate Professor of Anthropology and Urban Studies at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY.

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