Reclaiming the Living Memory: Dhaka’s Unique Revolution in 2024 and Rejection/Reappropriation of ‘Authorised’ Cultural Symbols by the Gen-Z
Imamur Hossain
While the central theme of critical heritage studies has long examined how ‘heritage’- as a tool serves the state to assert monumentality, grandeur, and materiality, and thus, by doing that- it often marginalizes secondary non-elite narratives within its discourse; there has been comparatively less focus on the consequences when a democratic state, driven by a calculated intent to consolidate its authority, seeks to remain in power through cultural manipulation using heritage. Such a regime may construct an all-embracing ideological narrative, apparently engaging the public, but subtly instituting channels to solidify financial interests, strategically institutionalize corruption, and entrench its dominance. In such instances, heritage becomes a vehicle not for pluralistic engagement, but for control and violation of pluriversal perspectives, trivializing multivocal and sometimes alternative histories and dissenting voices. While heritage becomes a socio-cultural process that coincides with power, subordinate voices in the heritage landscape are suppressed to create imbalanced representations.
In August 2024, Dhaka witnessed an unprecedented revolution, primarily led by students who ousted a government that had appeared unassailable just a month prior. Although the revolution originated from intentions to address unequal representation in government job quota, the protests, through incremental actions that crystallized dissent, revealed such a regime that wielded heritage as a nationalistic (and homogenizing) tool through state-induced cultural narratives while sidelining plurality and entrenching corruption. When these phenomena reached their boiling point, the youth rose to reclaim their voices - as reported by national and international media (Context News, CNN, BBC, 2024). While the organic organization of this revolution and the transformation of a student-led movement into a significant uprising against an authoritarian regime demand academic exploration in their own right, what I find particularly compelling is how this movement acted as a cultural statement. It highlighted the ways in which a state-sanctioned, dominant narrative could morph into an authoritarian one, marginalizing plurality. The uprising in June 2024, primarily spearheaded by Generation Z alongside workers and the masses, revealed the fragility of this control as they began to question whose voices and experiences were being erased from memories and which heritage truly belonged to them. This movement not only rejected these cultural impositions but also reappropriated symbols and ideas, infusing them with a renewed identity.
The July Revolution in Dhaka (By Wasiul Bahar - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=151170916)
This revolution, which gained popularity as ‘July Revolution’- marked a profound disjunction in the heritage discourse. The youth’s subsequent challenge to this authority wasn’t merely political; it was also cultural-memory work that questioned which voices and experiences had been relegated to oblivion and reclaimed the grassroots heritage that had been overshadowed. As the youth dismantled state icons and transformed public spaces with imperfect graffitis, these acts can academically also be seen beyond vandalism, rather a dissenting expression of cultural autonomy, where social collectives and solidarity networks rejected state-imposed narratives. In a way, the graffiti expressed in the public domain became anti-monuments—symbols of incremental actions resisting false dichotomies between state power and public memory. These expressions also somewhat underscored how active social subjects could reclaim the power to define their identity, using heritage not as an apparatus of the state but as a tool for social empowerment.
In the early hours of August 5, 2024, as the regime’s grip on Dhaka crumbled, the city’s streets became a canvas for this reclamation of memory. Key monuments, once symbols of authoritarian power, were defaced or transformed (CNN, 2024). These subversions of official iconography were not mere acts of destruction but rather attempts to preserve confluence between past and present, reshaping these symbols with new meanings that embraced identities and their demands and empowered the voices of social collectives. Generation Z’s reclamation of these spaces can be understood as a transgression—an act that not only rejected but also reappropriated the symbols meant to dictate cultural identity in Dhaka.
Impermanence and spontaneity became hallmarks of heritage expression as the Gen-Z transformed public spaces into platforms of resistance. Graffiti served as an unsanctioned form of memory work and counter-hegemonic practice that challenged the state’s imposed cultural ideologies. While the government’s monuments projected permanence, Gen Z’s expressions celebrated ephemerality, reshaping symbols with memes, iconography, and popular cultural references that mocked the state’s imposed narratives. Through such acts, they drew solidarity networks that bridged generational and class divides, engaging broader segments of society in the movement and ultimately contributing to the government’s downfall.
Images (Clockwise): 1. Gen Z reclaims traditional symbols, subverting them with new identities and popular memes, which mock the imposed narratives of the past. By doing so, they lighten the heavy history these symbols carry, engaging more people to join the movement and ultimately helping to bring down the government. 2. A powerful icon transformed: armed forces face a new kind of resistance, as Gen Z defends their stance through intellect and expression, wielding pens instead of weapons. 3 & 4. Mughdo, a young Gen Z graduate, who was shot during the protests, has emerged as a powerful symbol of resilience, his image replicated by school and college students on walls nationwide, representing both the cost and courage of their movement. (Images have been collected with permission to use from: https://julyarchive.cridobd.org/)
The dismantling of statues, monuments, and icons during this upheaval was a collective rejection of the state’s hegemonic practices that had imposed one-sided interpretations of history and public memories. The youth-led movement revealed how heritage, far from being a static relic of the past, could serve as heritage as social action—actively revised and redefined by the people it represents. This active memory work reconnected heritage to the populace, validating a shared narrative that transcended the cheap compensations of token representation offered by the state.
Image: A calendar marking the month of July, collaged with graffiti gathered from walls across the city, later transformed into a poster that gained widespread internet popularity. The printed version captures the collective voice of the movement in bold strokes. Artist: Reesham Shahab Tirtho/ Tirthosathan including Rafid Rahim Tilottoma Tithi, Mohammod Al Imran, SM Rafsanjani, Fatema Tuz Zohora Moumita, Farah Naz Nusrat, Imran Bin Abdul Khalique, Mayeesha Maimuna, Zunaid Pranto, Fardin Rafid, MD Rifatul Islam Pranto, Rubayat Islam Rupak, Nowshin Lamisa Chowdhury, Razin Jahir, Jahin Abrar, Azizul Hoque, Tahsina Anber Hera.
As Dhaka witnessed a seismic cultural and political shift as movements led predominantly by this Gen-Z upended such a longstanding regime that had wielded heritage as a tool of power- it was somewhat part of a broader query of how the past shall be remembered. As Bangladesh begins its next chapter, there is a test to create a heritage narrative in which all citizens will be able to recognize themselves—a mosaic of experiences and cultural memories. Most instructively, the revolution of 2024 stands as a testament that heritage is not some static relic from past eras; it is something that is always dynamic, as it is being rewritten by the people themselves. The youth of Dhaka have pointed out that the privilege of defining heritage is not an exclusive right of the state; rather, it is a shared responsibility with a particular burden on the younger generation, who stand as pivotal architects in crafting the collective narratives that encapsulate their identity.
Imamur Hossain
Assistant Professor of Department of Architecture, Sonargaon University and Coordinator of International Centre for Development and Environmental Studies
ACHS ECRN Coordinating Team Member
imamur.hossain@gmail.com
Acknowledgements:
The author expresses sincere gratitude to the July Revolution Archive (https://julyarchive.cridobd.org) for granting permission to use archival images documenting the 2024 Dhaka revolution. The following newspapers and media outlets are also acknowledged for their courtesy in providing photographs and content that enriched the narrative: Daily Star, CNN, Context News, Daily Sun, BDNews24, and Wikipedia Commons.
Special thanks go to Tirthosathan (Reesham Shahab Tirtho) for their impactful artwork that has visually enriched this write-up. Additionally, heartfelt recognition is extended to the following contributors whose creativity and vision have shaped the representation of the revolution’s narrative in that artwork: Rafid Rahim Tilottoma Tithi, Mohammod Al Imran, SM Rafsanjani, Fatema Tuz Zohora Moumita, Farah Naz Nusrat, Imran Bin Abdul Khalique, Mayeesha Maimuna, Zunaid Pranto, Fardin Rafid, MD Rifatul Islam Pranto, Rubayat Islam Rupak, Nowshin Lamisa Chowdhury, Razin Jahir, Jahin Abrar, Azizul Hoque, and Tahsina Anber Hera.
References:
References:
Daily Star. (2024). সরকারবিহীন ৩২ ঘণ্টা. Daily Star Bangla. Retrieved from https://bangla.thedailystar.net/news/bangladesh/news-603436
CNN. (2024, August 6). Bangladesh protests: Hasina’s resignation and the revolution explained. CNN. Retrieved from https://edition.cnn.com/2024/08/06/asia/bangladesh-protests-hasina-resignation-explainer-intl-hnk/index.html
Context News. (2024). A revolution in Bangladesh: What comes next? Context News. Retrieved from https://www.context.news/money-power-people/opinion/a-revolution-in-bangladesh-but-what-next
BDNews24 (2024). DU walls become a graffiti ‘gallery’. Retrieved from https://bdnews24.com/bangladesh/1605a13aeb4a
Wikipedia Commons. (2024). One-point movement in Bangladesh at Dhaka University. Retrieved from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:One_point_movement_of_Bangladesh_in_DU_35.jpg
