Remaking Urban Heritage : Refugee Walking Tours in Berlin, Jaffa, and Tel Aviv

Abstract

This book follows the perspectives of refugee activists to examine cities shaped by layered histories of war, colonialism, and partition. Challenging the crisis-driven, state-centric frameworks that dominate migration and border studies – where refugees are often cast as passive victims or threats – the book foregrounds their agency in reimagining urban heritage. Moving beyond the edge of the state to the heritage sites of the urban sphere, Remaking Urban Heritage explores refugee-led walking tours in Berlin, Jaffa, and Tel Aviv, tracing the entangled geographies of the Middle East, Africa, and Europe. Through a participatory ‘walk-along’ ethnography grounded in artistic practice, the book reconceptualizes heritage-making as a dynamic, contested, and transcultural process. By centring refugee storytelling, performance, and spatial knowledge, it offers a critical intervention into memory, urban, and migration studies – urging scholars and practitioners to rethink the politics of belonging amid ongoing displacement and to attend to the fluidity of urban heritage.