Sharjah: Sharjah Museums Authority has concluded the first phase of its award-winning SAWA Museum Studies Program. 

The first phase of the annual cross-cultural exchange program which covers diverse areas of working in museums, brought participants together from across the Arab world and Germany in Sharjah last February. 

During this phase in Sharjah, the sessions covered several topics including critical diversity awareness, what is a museum – local and international perspectives, participative strategies in collecting and documenting, curatorial strategies and the experiences of visitors and communities based on their interpretation of collections and displays. 

The meetings took place in Sharjah Art Museum, Sharjah Maritime Museum, Sharjah Heritage Museum, Sharjah Museum of Islamic Civilization, Sharjah Archeology Museum, Bait Al Naboodah, and Hisn Khor Fakkan. 

Phase two of the program will take place virtually between Sharjah and Berlin from March 13 to August 28, during which participants will continue to build on the discussions initiated in Sharjah and phase 3 will take place in Berlin between September 4 and 14.

Participants will engage in online and face-to-face seminars, workshops and projects throughout the year until December 2023 as the final phase continues from September 25 until November 20 before concluding the program on December 11.

Directed at Arab and German young museum professionals, the four-phase program is a long-running collaboration between SMA, the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin and the Goethe-Institute Gulf Region together with the University of Applied Sciences in Berlin and with the support of the German Federal Foreign Office.

SAWA, which means ‘Together’ in Arabic, was first held in Sharjah and Berlin in 2015 and 2016 respectively with an aim to introduce participants to other cultures while simultaneously providing them with an opportunity to study together and learn from each other’s experiences and expertise. 

The program supports and develops capabilities and necessary skills, by equipping participants with essential tools and international best practices in museology that are required in today’s world. 

In 2021, the program launched its ‘Glossary Project’ aimed at discussing museological terms in today’s world. 

The museological terms and their definitions based on their use and value within individual and local museological practices, were posted in the first issue of an online multicultural terminology publication. 

Over the years, the program has received several international awards including AGYA award for ‘promoting the role and value of the humanities in research, education and society’ in Berlin in 2019 and the Best Cultural Collaboration Award at LCD Berlin in 2020 which honours and celebrates the world’s top cultural destinations and is considered the 'Oscars for Museums’.