As part of the Memory of the World (MoW) Programme’s project to preserve documentary heritage in AlUla, implemented in partnership with the Royal Commission for AlUla, UNESCO has published a landmark academic study examining how AlUla’s unique documentary heritage fosters intercultural dialogue within the Arab Region and beyond.
AlUla has been a site of cultural exchange for millennia, as a
continually-inhabited social and commercial hub, and as a gathering
point along the historic pilgrimage route. In alignment with the
region’s historic cultural revival under UNESCO’s partnership with the
Royal Commission for AlUla (RCU), the MoW Programme publication
is a resource for the ways in which AlUla can serve as a blueprint for
dialogue and a cross-cultural understanding of our shared history.
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| Source: UNESCO/Studio Ketchup Mayo, attribution 3.0 IGO (CC BY 3.0 IGO). AlUla community member (right) with UNESCO staff (left) in Jabal Ikmah, AlUla. |
Dr Nour Allah Munawar's Documentary Heritage for Intercultural Dialogue: A Case Study of AlUla, Saudi Arabia explores the deep link between the ancient documentary heritage sprawling across the walls of AlUla’s mountains and its capacity to foster cross-cultural understanding, affirm cultural identity and serve as a powerful resource for dialogue among diverse communities.
Situated along the historic incense route, AlUla is home to thousands of inscriptions in ancient languages that help trace the evolution of the Arabic alphabet. Its ‘open-air library’, Jabal Ikmah, contains the largest concentration of well-preserved Dadanitic and Lihyanite inscriptions found anywhere in the world, and in providing a gateway into ancient life by illuminating our understanding of the history of the Arabian Peninsula.
Jabal Ikmah’s inscriptions have since entered UNESCO’s Memory of the World (MoW) International Register as an internationally significant item of documentary heritage.
Dr Munawar’s study places particular emphasis on the voices of AlUla’s local community, incorporating their perspectives through focus group discussions that achieved gender balance and included a majority of participants under the age of 35.
The publication also incorporates insights of heritage professionals through in-depth interviews, merging international understanding with the wisdom of community custodians who have played a key role in enabling the identification and preservation of, as well as access to, AlUla’s documentary heritage.
The research explores and proposes the empowerment of community members as stewards and custodians of documentary heritage while recommending the integration of a documentary heritage education into formal pedagogical curricula across KSA, as well as informally through community engagement, public events, and cultural festivals to educate the general public.
The research also considers the harnessing of innovative technologies as crucial for using documentary heritage for intercultural dialogue. High-resolution 3D scanning and photogrammetry can digitally preserve fragile rock inscriptions and artefacts, especially those at risk from environmental decay, while virtual and augmented reality technologies can recreate historical documentary heritage sites to bridge distances and enable intercultural appreciation of documentary heritage.
For awareness and enhancing engagement with documentary heritage in the Arab region among both the general public and heritage professionals, the publication advocates for the promotion of knowledge production on documentary heritage in the region, including through initiatives for Arabic-language research, the translation of key documentary heritage and MoW Programme resources, the development of digital platforms, and other activities.
Established in 1992, UNESCO’s MoW Programme helps safeguard documentary heritage throughout the world, facilitating its preservation, promoting access to it, and enabling awareness of its significance.