Sana Murrani, Rupturing Architecture: Spatial Practices of Refuge in Response to War and Violence in Iraq, 2003–2023 (Bloomsbury Visual Arts, 2024).
Jadaliyya (J): What made you write this book?
Sana Murrani (SM): The reason for writing this book is deeply rooted in my personal and professional journey as an architect from Baghdad who has lived experiences of trauma, war, and loss. Having grown up during the Iraq-Iran War and the subsequent multitudes of aggression and deprivation across the country until the aftermath of the 2003 US-led invasion, I have long been compelled to understand how people in different parts of the country navigate and cope with such adversities spatially. Witnessing the ways in which Iraqis create refuge and reinvent their environments amidst war and violence has profoundly inspired this work.
There is a scarcity of research on the region’s informal spatial practices of refuge, particularly in Iraq, which faces a wide spectrum of traumas and socio-political struggles. This book addresses that gap, giving voice and visibility to Iraqis while serving as a tribute to all Iraqis, both living and lost, over decades of ruptures and destruction. While it acknowledges the traumas and violence endured, it also highlights the ingenious ways people have responded creatively in their pursuit of refuge.
It proposes a dual articulation of rupture—both as an infliction of trauma and as a creative response through place-making.
J: What particular topics, issues, and literatures does the book address?
SM: The book addresses critical topics, centering on the spatial and temporal dimensions of architecture, trauma, memory, creativity, and imagination in the context of Iraq's recent history. It situates architecture as a discourse and practice that navigates the tensions between permanence and transience, particularly in a landscape scarred by decades of war and violence. The book examines how architecture, rather than being static, becomes a site of power, resistance, and trauma. It delves into the transformative years between 2003 and 2023, using creative storytelling and deep mapping techniques, along with interviews with Iraqis from across the country. The narratives are supported by specific case studies of buildings and sites where trauma has permanently altered their use, illustrating the evolving nature of cities and spaces amidst protracted violence.
The book argues that post-trauma reconstruction should not aim to restore cities to their pre-war state but must recognize the irreversible changes wrought by violence and the transformations experienced by both people and spaces. It creates spatial stories from fifteen interviews with Iraqis, spanning the 2003 US-led invasion; the sectarian violence between 2006 and 2008, atrocities committed by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), also known as Daesh, in 2014 against the Yazidi community in Sinjar (in the northwest of Iraq) and Mosul; the 2019 Tishreen Movement (also known as the October Movement; Tishreen is the Arabic word for October); the Covid-19 pandemic; and the manifestation of climate crises in Iraq, up to 2023. These narratives are visually mapped to highlight the resilience, creativity, and refuge-making practices of Iraqis, demonstrating how these practices serve as forms of resistance and emphasizing the complex dynamics of trauma, memory, and place-making after place-wounding.
Drawing on a feminist spatial practice lens, the book elaborates on Edward Said’s concept of a “struggle over geography” and Edward Soja’s “spatial justice” by proposing a manifesto of spatial justice with a view from Iraq. It proposes a dual articulation of rupture—both as an infliction of trauma and as a creative response through place-making. This duality is essential for understanding how refuge spaces emerge as sites of resistance and transformation. Methodologically, the book employs a creative deep mapping approach, using memory-work, storytelling, and autoethnography to create palimpsestic narratives that layer spatial, social, and political dimensions. This non-linear method captures the complex interplay between trauma and memory, presenting a multidimensional analysis of refuge-making practices in Iraq. You can view a visual archive of the deep maps created on this link.
Through interdisciplinary literature from scholars of southern narratives’ expertise and particularly Iraqi and Middle Eastern scholars, the book positions architecture as a political and active practice that navigates scales of difference and justice. By expanding the definition of architecture beyond aesthetics and professional norms, it frames refuge as an ongoing, creative, and political process—a transformative response to the ruptures inflicted by war and violence.
J: How does this book connect to and/or depart from your previous work?
SM: I have always viewed architecture and its practice as a discourse engaged with constant change and transience in space, events, experiences, and time. This ongoing struggle with the field's inherent spatial fixity is central to my research, especially in the context of this book, where the destruction of homes, public buildings, neighbourhoods, cities, and livelihoods has scarred the geography of Iraq for decades, if not centuries. Since my time as a Master’s student at the University of Baghdad’s School of Architecture, just before the 2003 invasion, I developed a fascination with the instability of architecture and its relation to other fields of practice.
In my PhD thesis, completed in the United Kingdom, I experimented with architecture made using alternative materials—futuristic ones that allow for change and transience without scarring cities, creating a form of "making otherwise." Throughout my academic career, I have positioned myself as an unconventional architect, advocating for reuse and restoration rather than new construction. As you know, the building industry significantly contributes to climate change. I often tell my students, now studying architecture, that our profession forces us to "break in order to make." We have to chop trees, dig into the earth, and mix concrete to build. This "place-wounding" for the sake of "place-making" is part of the profession’s daily reality. Therefore, to create an alternative form of architecture, we must think and make otherwise.
This is why I have dedicated all my previous work to this book—finding the right tools, methods, and conceptual frameworks rooted in place and people's attachments to place-making to explore alternative ways of making architecture. I have worked closely with those displaced—refugees, people seeking asylum, and internally displaced persons—who have lost their sense of belonging and attachment to familiar places, helping them to find their place through participatory design practices and co-creation.
J: Who do you hope will read this book, and what sort of impact would you like it to have?
SM: I envision this book reaching a diverse readership. Core disciplines such as architecture and design, particularly those invested in humanitarian and adaptive structures, as well as human geography, sociology, and politics, are primary audiences. Scholars interested in concepts of home, domesticity, urbanity, borders, war, and protective structures like shelter will find valuable insights. Beyond academia, I expect practicing architects, designers, humanitarian and development practitioners, and activists to engage with its content. Organizations like UN-Habitat, UNDP, and Architecture Sans Frontières, along with museums and cultural heritage institutions, could also benefit from the perspectives shared. To ensure broader reach, I have intentionally written the book in an accessible style, inviting a wider audience interested in the geo/spatial politics of Iraq’s recent history through people’s stories.
In terms of impact, the book seeks to advance the field of spatial justice within architecture, specifically in Iraq’s context, through empirical fieldwork and critical, reflexive, and performative practice that expand on post-war and conflict urban studies, proposing a socially rooted practice for developing structures of refuge, especially in post-war scenarios. The book also emphasizes the importance of seeing architecture otherwise, beyond fixed aesthetics, and affords new design possibilities that can anticipate and respond to future trauma. A justice-centered approach must integrate these refuge spaces into diverse forms of homing and more-than-inhabitation practices. In volatile and unstable geographies, a fixed perspective is insufficient; we require a framework of knowledge that, while fragmented and nonlinear, remains both performative and imaginative. Only then can we truly address the ever-shifting spatial needs of those navigating the aftermath of trauma.
J: What other projects are you working on now?
SM: Since completing the book, I have been working on a project with survivors of the Yazidi genocide perpetrated by ISIS in Iraq, creating a "ruptured atlas" that traces their odyssey of home, forced displacement, encampment, migration, and, for some, their return to Sinjar. As part of my recent appointment as a Visiting Senior Fellow at the LSE Middle East Centre, I have begun working on a project called Post-Colonial Geographies of Resistance: Mapping Spatial Justice in the Middle East. This project explores the political performativity and imagination embedded in mapping the Middle East, interrogating how Western cartographic practices historically divided the region and continue to shape contemporary geopolitical and cultural landscapes.
Excerpt from the book (from the Conclusion: A Manifesto for Structures of Refuge in Spatial Justice, pages 192 to 194)
This research illuminates the transformative potential of map-making, expanding its role from a tool of mere representation to one of knowledge production. It reveals the intricacy of the task of visually capturing the negotiated spatiality that is tethered to memory, imagination and trauma. Importantly, this research finds that the maps produced serve as vital platforms for both encapsulating and expressing the traumatic experiences of Iraqis. Laden with affective layers of identity, belonging and memory-work, these maps capture ephemeral meaning while also providing a dynamic account of trauma in the making – factors that emphasize the performativity of map-making as a practice (Della Dora 2009). The making of these maps functions as a potent practice into the lived experience of trauma, presenting a unique topological frame of knowledge around place-wounding. The study also uncovers the iterative technical composition of the maps, highlighting a profound empathy between diverse geographies across Iraq. This is further reflected in the amalgamation of collapsed geographies and microgeographies of memories and events across three performative scales: the conceptual, the material and the geospatial. As such, these maps serve various purposes: as a cathartic process, a visual documentation of stories at risk of fading from personal and collective memory, and as a method of practising the making of refuge spaces. These findings underscore the disruptive potential of map-making as a means of narrating trauma spatially. The research suggests the potential for a broader application of these methodologies into other critical geographies, contexts and disciplines.
In order to effectively narrate the trauma experienced by Iraqis and to engage with various intended audiences – academics, researchers, policymakers, the media and the general public – it was necessary to adopt many multifaceted modes of practice. These modes included interviews that were transcribed and translated, the thematic coding and analysis of the spatiality described, and the spatially layered moments of trauma that became the core of each map. Other creative forms of representation were also incorporated into the map-making process, such as trauma-focused pop-up books portraying the interviewees’ photographs, three-dimensional depictions of the spatiality of these traumas, and postcards. This creative, ‘palimpsestuous’ (Dillon 2007) approach facilitated the intricate layers of knowledge production through its performative role in the methodology of deep mapping. The reach of this palimpsest of trauma narratives was further extended through an online visual archive (Murrani 2023) as well as an exhibition at the LSE Middle East Centre. These platforms allowed for a diverse range of creative expressions, all offering different perspectives on the narration of spatial trauma. These varied expressions have opened up yet more pathways for this kind of work, including the promotion of self-perceived recovery from trauma and loss, enhancing quality of life through the arts and spatial practice, and improving access to equity and justice. Furthermore, they inform public and political debates that challenge established norms, ways of thinking and modes of practice. The multilayered approach used in this research not only showcases the power and potential of interdisciplinary methods in addressing complex social issues, but also directly contributes a new framework for knowledge-making as a spatial practice in the context of Iraq, culminating in a manifesto for structures of refuge in spatial justice.
