In Conversation with Salima Naji

Abstract

Salima Naji is a registered architect (Paris La Villette School of Architecture, Paris) with a PhD in social anthropology from the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales. She is based in Morocco and has been working on projects to protect southern Morocco’s oasis heritage for the past twenty years. She has designed, restored, or built over thirty bioclimatic buildings in unfired clay and/or stone: maternity hospitals, cultural and women’s centers, eco-lodges or hostels, boarding schools, museums, etc. She established her practice in Morocco in 2004, a studio specializing in the innovative use of sustainable raw materials and biosourced technologies (earth, stone, and palm tree fiber). In addition to her professional work, she also participates in sustainable research and action programs for environmental development in collaboration with local communities. She has published extensively, both in academia and for a larger audience, in French, English, and Arabic. Naji was awarded the Young Architects Prize from the EDF Foundation (Paris, 2004), the Holcim Prize for Sustainable Development, Africa-Middle East (2011), Takrim of the Order of Architects of Morocco (2010 and 2019), and the Chevalier Arts & Lettres de la République Française (2017). She was also twice shortlisted for the Aga Khan Award for Architecture (2013 and 2022).

Notes

1 Salima Naji, Architectures of the Common Good: For an Ethic of Preservation (Genève: Métis Presses, 2019).

2 See Salima Naji, Greniers collectifs de l’Atlas, patrimoines du Sud marocain (Aix-en-Provence: Edisud, 2006), and “Les entrepôts de la baraka: du grenier collectif à la zawya: réseaux du sacré et processus de patrimonialisation dans l’Atlas et Maroc présaharien,” (PhD thesis in Ethnology and Social Anthropology, Paris, EHESS, 2008).

3 See Salima Naji, “Les greniers collectifs marocains: de l’économie traditionnelle au patrimoine à vocation touristique: Collective institution and common good,” in Patrimoine et sacralisation, patrimonialisation du sacré, Sites réputés “sacrés” projetés dans l’univers profane du patrimoine, Cahiers de l’Institut du patrimoine de l’Université de Québec à Montréal UQAM, ed. Etienne Berthold (Québec: Editions Multimondes, 2009):187–206.

4 Djinn Jacques-Meunié, Greniers-citadelles au Maroc (Paris: Arts & Métiers Graphiques, 1951).

5 See Pierre Caye, Durer. Éléments pour la transformation du système productif [Elements for the Transformation of the Productive System] (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2020).

6 https://www.guedelon.fr/fr/le-projet

7 Salima Naji, “Architectures de l’adaptation,” Architecture d’aujourd’hui 426 (September 2018), https://www.larchitecturedaujourdhui.fr/salma-naji/.

8 Théodore Monod, Méharées: Explorations au vrai Sahara (Paris: Je Sers, 1937).

9 Monod, Meharees. See also his L’émeraude des Garamantes, Actes sud, 1948 and 1992.

10 Isabelle Eberhardt, Ecrits sur le sable, Marie-Odile Delacour and Jean-René Huleu, scientific eds. (Grasset, 1989).

11 Odette du Puigaudeau, Pieds nus à travers la Mauritanie, préface du général Gouraud, Plon, 1936 ; Phébus, 1992, prix Anaïs-Ségalas de l’Académie française en 1937, Le sel du désert, ed. P. Tisné, 1940 ; Phébus, 2001.