Colonial Heritage in a Postcolonial World

IJIA’s annual Dialogues series brings together scholars and practitioners from across varied disciplines for a discussion of critical contemporary issues that interrogate the boundaries between architecture, art, anthropology, heritage, and history. This session, its fourth instalment, was held as a webinar in February 2024 and was convened by Associate Editor Daniel Coslett. It featured three heritage specialists – Leila Ben-Gacem, Alaa El-Habashi, and Lahbib El Moumni – from across North Africa. In it, participants addressed the salience of colonial-era built environments, national identities and activism, sources of funding for heritage management, and revealing variances in the region’s conservation practices. Though focused on Tunisia (occupied by France from 1881 to 1956), Egypt (occupied by the United Kingdom in various ways from 1882 to 1956), and Morocco (occupied by France and Spain from 1912 to 1956), the optimistic conversation engaged issues that have a wider relevance across the postcolonial world. This annotated excerpt of the conversation has been slightly edited for clarity and length.