Acts of Spatial Violation: Constructing the Political Inside the Palestinian Refugee Camp

Palestinian refugee camps as sites of exceptional political practice has been excessively established in scholarly work (Agamben, Agier, Khalili, Hanafi). What is missing is a true architectural mapping in the field to be able to spatially understand how this space operates the political exception it resides within. My PhD research directly tackles the politics of architecture and spatial practices –exercised by both the refugees and their host governments-- inside two specific Palestinian refugee camps, one each in Jordan and Lebanon. Ambitious fieldwork and critical mapping of the spatial chronology in each camp has been conducted throughout the PhD process. The fieldwork also included spatial interventions which directly addressed what shaped the Palestinian camp beginning from the relief-scale –-a defined 100m2 rectangle, being the UN’s official standard for individual housing plots within the camps—, tracing its transformation over 69 years of protracted asylum into a scale which transgresses the 100m2 plot boundary, stripping the camp from its relief scale and re-appropriating it as a truly Palestinian one. It is in this, beyond the 100m2, where I claim the political resides in the camp as form, scale, and practice, which is termed in Arabic as ta’addi (encroach, exceed, violate), and which I reinterpret here as spatial violation. Drawing on from my working experience for UNWRA, and from now being a PhD by Design student engaged in proposing designs for these camps, my thesis aims to unravel the impact of host-government policies on the physical form of these camps, examining in particular the issues of control and vulnerability. Furthermore, I will be proposing an alternative method for analysing these Palestinian camp-spaces, as well as suggesting new tools for designing and creating the necessary spatial interventions that can enhance the self-determination of refugees and the potential of their camp-spaces to offer resistance

Acts of Spatial Violation: The Politics of Space-Making inside the Palestinian Refugee Camp

Refugee camps have been, and continue to be, highly polemical spaces to inhabit and study. Notions such as temporality, permanence, exception and camp-cities are used in academic publications in an attempt to understand the continued existence of these spaces. Scholars nonetheless have fallen short of presenting a historical narrative, or convincing argument, as to why and how these camps can ensure their continued operation within often violent and complex host geographies. Refugee camps are not merely humanitarian spaces relegated to international aid programmes. On the contrary, due to their common protracted nature, they have evolved into some of the most dynamic and vital forms of built environment. The fundamental element which guarantees this vitalism, in socio-economic and political terms, is space and space-making. This essay, based on long-term fieldwork research in two Palestinian refugee camps – Baqa’a in Jordan and Burj el Barajneh in Lebanon –showcases the specific ingenious acts of space-making developed by Palestinian refugees throughout 73 years of forced displacement. Furthermore, the essay introduces the notion of ‘spatial violations’ to describe the political act of space-making adopted by Palestinian refugees to overcome modes of ‘management and control’ by host governments and the United Nations. Scenarios of violence and economic development triggered by these acts of ‘spatial violation’ will also be illustrated, as will some spatial interventions designed and built inside these two Palestinian camps as part of this research project. The installations were designed as experiential architectural devices to provoke conversation around space and space-making across Palestinian camps

‘Space of Refuge’: Negotiating Space with Refugees Inside the Palestinian Camp

‘Space of Refuge’ is a spatial installation directly addressing issues of inhabitation within Palestinian refugee camps in different host countries. It does so by illustrating the various modes of spatial production and subsequent evolution of Palestinian refugee camps, with particular focus upon unofficial acts of “spatial violation” that have emerged because of the increasingly protracted nature of the refugee situation

Free Microsurgical and Pedicled Flaps for Oncological Mandibular Reconstruction: Technical Aspects and Evaluation of Patient Comorbidities

Oncologic mandibular reconstruction has changed significantly over the years and continues to evolve with the introduction of newer technologies and techniques. Patient demographic, reconstructive, and complication data were obtained from a prospectively maintained clinical database of patients who underwent head and neck reconstruction at our institution. The free fibular flap is now considered the gold standard for mandibular reconstruction. However, in patients with multiple comorbidities, lengthy procedures may be less optimal and pedicled flaps, with specific modifications, can yield reasonable outcomes. Technical aspects and comorbidity profiles are examined in the oncological mandibular reconstruction cohort