Speaker: Melanie Schulze Tanielian, Assistant Professor, Department of History, University of Michigan.
Graffiti as an public marker of dissent, social criticism and expression of political and sectarian ideologies has a long history in Beirut. It became a particularly potent marker of contested spaces during the fifteen year-long civil war (1975-1990), which the journalist Maria Chakhtoura has coined "la Guerre des Graffiti." During the civil war, inhabitants of the city only glanced at writings, stencils and images on a wall and it would be obvious which militia or political party was in control of that particular street, block, or neighborhood of the city. In this lecture, I will explore the public discourse that found it's expression through "street art" during the war which was marked by fragmentation and division and explore its changing meaning in the post-war period.