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Moroccan artisans and craftsmen are joining forces to protect the art of tile making, known as zellige, from cultural appropriation. The move is part of a colloquium organized by the Rabat-Salé Regional Chamber of Crafts to discuss strategies for safeguarding Morocco's rich cultural heritage.
Held in partnership with the Club du patrimoine et des arts and UNESCO, the event, which started Monday, is a platform for Moroccan artisans to express their frustration with attempts to appropriate zellige, an integral part of Moroccan identity and tradition, 2M reported. They also denounced recent requests by neighboring Algeria to claim Moroccan cultural symbols like the caftan and zellige as its own.
To counter these efforts, the Chamber of Crafts called for the swift submission of a dossier for the inscription of zellige and the caftan on Morocco's Intangible Cultural Heritage List. They also pledged to write to Morocco's Ambassador and Permanent Representative to UNESCO to address this matter, Hespress wrote Tuesday.
This urgency follows Algeria's Culture Minister Soria Mouloudji announcing a UNESCO application for «the art and architectural decoration – zellige», describing it as «Algerian» ancestral know-how.
This is not the first time zellige has been at the center of a cultural appropriation debate. In 2022, German sportswear giant Adidas faced similar accusations from Morocco for using zellige motifs on the Algerian national soccer team's jerseys.
