Third-year Report—Dec. 2022. Anthropological survey of al-‘Ulā community and its oasis system

– Vincent Battesti & Léo Marty (2022) — « Third-year Report—Dec. 2022. Anthropological survey of al-‘Ulā community and its oasis system » Annual Report to AFALULA, Paris, CNRS, 29 p.

⟶ Annual report for the al-‘Ulā AS project.

– Purpose of the document:

This document reports the progress made during the third year (October 2021 – September 2022) for the project “Anthropological survey of al-‘Ulā community and its oasis system” (known as al-‘Ulā AS project). These advances are to be put into perspective according to the somewhat particular context of this research project. Indeed, the Covid-19 pandemic impacted the forecasted calendar. While the schedule planned for fieldwork, recruitment of a postdoctoral researcher in ethnoecology, expertise of an agricultural engineer, and expertise of anthropologist colleagues on short missions for year 1 and year 2 were delayed, we adapted and underwent research. In doing so, we had promising intermediate results. In light of the pandemic situation we faced, we consider, however, that the project needs a supplementary year to properly complete its analysis of the local situation. Nevertheless, it is planned to write up some of the results in progress (intermediate, we must insist) into peer-reviewed research papers to be published in scientific journals, to provide a scientific knowledge base that can be shared with fellow researchers from other projects and stakeholders in the development of al- ‘Ulā (and this, as early as the next few months).

Two young Bedouins at the northern camel racecourse, al-‘Ulā oasis, Saudi Arabia, April 10, 2020, by Vincent Battesti