Reem is a researcher on critical heritage studies and cultural participation. Holding Honours degrees (RIBA) in Architecture and an ongoing PhD, she studies identity, performative narration, and values of cultural heritage.

On ground, she advocates for cultural democracy on two levels: vertically by re-thinking the conventional approaches to heritage decision-making for including the plural and subjective possibilities of valuing and using heritage; and horizontally by illuminating the possible exclusivity of non-governmental art and cultural practices, and related policies, and their tendency to aggravate social contestation and fragmentation.

As one of her civil society engagements, Reem is Founder & Managing Director of Scene, a non-profit for protecting cultural heritage in the Medina of Tripoli using strategies of ethnography and theatrical psychology to engage communities and foster proximity between two contesting groups for pollination of valuing.

She is Author of Libya’s Country Profile on Cultural Governance for EU/MedCulture; receiver of Society of Architectural Historians’ Opler Grant Award; Alumna of U.S. Department of State’s IVLP and of Goethe’s Kulturakademie; Contributor/Delegate to a number of UNESCO and Réseau Euro-Med France initiatives, former Fellow at ISPA; a member of jury and mentor in a number of international initiatives; and a university lecturer and artist.