Khaoula Stiti
Scholar, architect and writer
This website is currently being developed.
About me
I am an architect trained at the National School of Architecture in Tunis (2015) and holding a doctorate from the Université libre de Bruxelles (2024). My work sits at the intersection of heritage studies, participatory methodologies, decolonial computing, and the politics of knowledge production in North–South research partnerships. My doctoral research examined heritage management in Tunisia through a Global North Global South collaboration project developing a heritage participatory platform. My current work interrogates the political and epistemological conditions under which digital technologies, including Artificial Intelligence, shape what counts as knowledge and heritage in Global South contexts.
Should you seek further clarification or wish to explore potential collaborations based on the content within these pages, please don't hesitate to contact me!
Research
Doctoral researchHeritage at the Nexus of Participation and Digital Platforms: Contextual Specificities in Tunis and Theoretical and Experimental FrameworksSummary :
This doctoral research project delves into the multifaceted nature of heritage, with a specific focus on the convergence of participation and digital platforms. It addresses research inquiries about the specific management of heritage in post-revolutionary Tunisia, the theoretical framework surrounding participation actors and practices, interactions with participatory digital heritage platforms, and considerations for designing a participatory mobile platform based on P@trimonia 2 research project. The aim is to provide an understanding of the intricate dynamics inherent in heritage management and digital engagement. The manuscript comprises several chapters exploring these inquiries, ranging from an examination of the contextual specifics in Tunis to the conceptualization of a participatory mobile platform. Each chapter presents contributions based on case studies, literature reviews, and workshops, exploring diverse aspects of participatory practices in heritage and the role played by digital platforms. These contributions collectively enhance the comprehensive understanding of the intricate interplay among heritage, participatory practices, and digital platforms within and beyond the unique context of Tunis.Academic visits
1. Visiting Researcher to Centre Norbert Elias CNRS (UMR 8562), France for 6 months, (01/02/2023 to 28/07/2023), supported by Université libre de Bruxelles Mobility Funds.
Activities included participating in methodological experiments on the heritage perceptions project at Chartreuse de Villeneuve lez Avignon and attending the series of lectures of the seminar "Heritage in Representations".
Contact: Prof. Lise RENAUD.2. Visiting researcher to PAE3C - Architectural and Environmental Heritage research unit, Carthage University, Tunisia for 6 months, from 13/06/2022 to 16/12/2022, funded by SfaxForward project, supported by Horizon 2020 program.
Contact: Prof. Fakher KHARRAT.
Activities included a data collection campaign that aimed to gather information for the P@trimonia platform development and for my doctoral research. The results of the subsequent data analysis have led to a scientific publication. (cf. publication 3 in Scientific Contributions section)3. Visiting student to Lab for User Cognition & Innovative Design (LUCID), University de Liège, for 4 months from April to July 2021, funded by the University of Liège Mobility Funds.
Contact: Prof. Pierre LECLERQ.
Activities included developing the mockups for P@trimonia mobile application and literature review on participatory heritage platforms.4. Visiting student to PAE3C - Architectural and Environmental Heritage research unit, Carthage University, Tunisia for 6 months, from 13/06/2022 to 16/12/2022. The funding was awarded after winning The Travel Grants Competition by the Ministry of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation.
Contact: Prof. Fakher KHARRAT.
Activities included conducting historical research on the historic urban landscape of Tunis and its colonial heritage and a literature review on the historical urban landscape approach of UNESCO.
Scientific Contributions
Journal articlesStiti, K. (2026). Outside the Discipline, Inside the Data: A Retrospective Account of an Undocumented Tunisian Language Corpus in an Extractivist Research Context. Journal of Open Humanities Data.Turki, S. Y., & Stiti, K. (2024). Heritage Management in Post-Revolutionary Tunisia: a Case Study from Mhamdia. ESTOA, 13(25), 113–125. DOI: 10.18537/EST.V013.N025.A07Stiti, K. (2024). Navigating Identities and Building Support Community through Art: a Beyond Academia Journey in Brussels. Culture Caleidoscoop, 2(1). DOI: 10.57031/culcal.v2i1.14647Stiti, K., & Ben Rajeb, S. (2022). 2Ws + 1H Systematic Review to (Re)Draw Actors and Challenges of Participation(s): Focus on Cultural Heritage. Architecture, 2(2), 307–333. DOI: 10.3390/architecture2020018Book chaptersStiti, K. (2025). Challenges in the Collaborative Design of Participatory Heritage Platforms between the Global North and Global South: Towards Decolonial Computing. In T. Lähdesmäki, J. Turunen, A. Terian & R. Garcia-Bardidia (Eds.), Engaging Communities in Cultural Heritage. Routledge.Stiti, K. (2023). To Appreciate (Or Not) the Colonial Downtowns in Tunisia: an Essay from Tunis, About Tunis. In M. Schalk, K. Reisinger, E. Markus & U. Leconte (Eds.), Material Practices: Positionality, Methodology, and Ethics. TUM Press.Stiti, K., & Ben Rajeb, S. (in press). La Participation via les Technologies d'Information et de Communication pour une Prise de Conscience du Patrimoine. In Patrimoine(s) et Nouvelles Technologies. Éditions de l'Université de Bruxelles.Conference papersStiti, K., Achour, S., & Ben Rajeb, S. (2025). Questioning Heritage Values: Lessons Learned from an Inventory of the Architectural and Urban Landscape of the 19th and 20th Centuries of Tunis. In T. Teba & A. Di Raimo (Eds.), Conservation of Architecture and Urban Heritage. Springer. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-71145-9_5Stiti, K., & Ben Rajeb, S. (2024). Assessment of Non-Researcher Generated Data within the Framework of Heritage Attributes: Insights and Challenges. In Cooperative Design, Visualization, and Engineering. CDVE 2024. LNCS. Springer. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-71315-6_9Stiti, K., & Ben Rajeb, S. (2023). Participatory Heritage Platforms for Raising Awareness of Endangered Heritage: Usability and Acceptability Study in the Historical Urban Landscape of Tunis. In H2PTM'23: La Fabrique du Sens à l'Ère de l'Information Numérique (pp. 218–234). ISTE Group. HAL: hal-05196028Stiti, K. (2022). Revisiting Participation in Research: a Literature Review to Rearrange the Definitions of "Research With" in Heritage. In Proceedings of the 4th International and Interdisciplinary Conference on Images and Imagination (pp. 580–587). PVBLICA.Stiti, K., Jeunejean, A., & Ben Rajeb, S. (2022). Participatory Collection and Dissemination of Architectural and Urban Heritage Information: P@trimonia Platform. In Cooperative Design, Visualization, and Engineering. CDVE 2022. LNCS 13492. Springer. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-16538-2_27Stiti, K., Achour, S., & Ben Rajeb, S. (2022). Valuing Built Heritage through the Promotion of Oral Heritage via Participation in the Digital Age. In Proceedings of COLLA 2022 (pp. 9–16). ThinkMind.
Invited presentations and international conferences
2026Stiti, K. (2026). Before the Algorithm: Decolonial Computing as a Methodological Prerequisite for AI-Assisted Heritage Research in Africa. In Digital Humanities and Artificial Intelligence in African Studies: Towards Sustainable and Equitable Practices. 21–24 September 2026, Stellenbosch, South Africa.Stiti, K. (2026). The Ruins of Extraction: Abandoned Railway Stations and Lines and the Political Economy of Rural Neglect in Jendouba, Northwest Tunisia. In International Writeshop in Critical Agrarian Studies and Scholar-Activism. 1–10 July 2026, Beijing, China.Stiti, K. (2026). Seven Cards: Artefacts of Time. In CESSMIR Conference, Looking Back, Moving Forward: Migration Studies in Times of Societal Transformation. 14–16 September 2026, Ghent, Belgium.Stiti, K. (2026). Decolonial Computing as a Prerequisite: Why AI Cannot Be Neutral in Global South Heritage Contexts. In HyperHeritage International Symposium (HIS). 19 June 2026, Valenciennes, France.2024Stiti, K. (2024). Neoliberal Shame, Coloniality, and Migrant Resistance in Belgian Francophone Academia. In Bridging Divides in Gender Migration Studies: Enhancing North-South Cooperation for Inclusive Knowledge. 18 November 2024, Ghent, Belgium.Stiti, K. (2024). Colonial Heritage at the Nexus of Digital Participation: Contextual Specificities in Tunis and Theoretical and Experimental Frameworks. In Annual Research Seminar of the School of Architecture and Spatial Planning, Technical University of Kenya. 12 August 2024, Nairobi, Kenya.Stiti, K. (2024). "If You Are a Migrant in Academia, Don't Be Ashamed": The Role of Migration Studies and Migrant Scholars in Dismantling Shame in the Neoliberal University. In 21st Annual IMISCOE Conference: Migration as a Social Construction – A Reflexive Turn. 2 July 2024, Lisbon, Portugal (online).Stiti, K. (2024). Exploring Marginalised Realms: Navigating Academia at the Intersections of Coloniality and Power. In Doing Mobile Ethnography: Early-Career Scholars' Training Workshop in Urban Methodology. 13 May 2024, Shanghai, China.Stiti, K. (2024). Colonial Heritage at the Nexus of Digital Participation: Contextual Specificities in Tunis and Theoretical and Experimental Frameworks. In Towards Sustainable Rural-Urban Development of Human Settlement – The Asian-African Collaborative Network. 12 May 2024, Shanghai, China.2023Stiti, K. (2023). Bridging Contextual Divides: Exploring Decolonial Computing for Participatory Collection and Dissemination of Information of Architectural Heritage in Diverse Settings. In Revisiting Cultural Heritage: Novel Approaches, Innovative Methods, and Transnational Connections. 27 October 2023, Sibiu, Romania.Stiti, K., Renaud, L., & Ben Rajeb, S. (2023). Digital Platforms and Participatory Narratives: Unveiling the Influence of Social Media on Heritagization. In Life Narrative and the Digital 2023. 27 September 2023, Vienna, Austria (online).Stiti, K., Achour, S., & Ben Rajeb, S. (2023). Questioning Heritage Values: Lessons Learned from an Inventory of the Architectural and Urban Landscape of the 19th and 20th Centuries of Tunis. In Conservation of Architectural Heritage. 14 September 2023, Portsmouth, United Kingdom (online).Stiti, K. (2023). Quel rôle pour le numérique participatif dans la réponse aux enjeux de la patrimonialisation ? In Transformations sociétales en Afrique et en Haïti : action publique, participation citoyenne et représentations culturelles, Chaire UNESCO Défis partagés du développement : Savoir, Comprendre, Agir. 9 June 2023, Casablanca, Morocco.Stiti, K., & Ben Rajeb, S. (2023). Assessing the Attributes of Heritage and Their Credibility and Usability to Improve the User Experience on Participatory Platforms. In Digital Humanities Benelux 2023. 31 May 2023, Brussels, Belgium.2021Stiti, K., & Ben Rajeb, S. (2021). Participation and Collaboration between Research Institutions and Civil Society Organisations in Digital Heritage Projects in Tunisia. In Living Digital Heritage 2021. 5 November 2021, Sydney, Australia (online).Stiti, K. (2021). Heritage in Conflict in Tunis. In Approaching Research Practice in Architecture 2021. 14 October 2021, Munich, Germany (online).Stiti, K., & Cherif, S. (2021). Participatory Approaches of Built Heritage Promotion and Appropriation in Tunisia: Case of European Neighborhood of Downtown Tunis. In Heritage Borders of Engagement Network. 15 June 2021, Tunis, Tunisia (online).Stiti, K. (2021). Approches participatives au service de la valorisation du patrimoine par le citoyen en Tunisie. In 2010–2020, une décennie de changements dans le monde arabe. 30 January 2021, Tunis, Tunisia (online).PostersStiti, K. (2022). Application of Action Research in Research Projects Aimed at Raising Awareness of Heritage: Case of the 19th and 20th Centuries Architectural and Urban Heritage of the European City-Centre of Tunis. In Inaugural Seminar of the Doctoral School 62: Architecture, Urban Planning, Architectural and Urban Engineering. 4 March 2022, Brussels, Belgium.
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