By Ro Maung Shwe
Inside the crowded refugee camps of Ukhiya, where bamboo shelters stretch across the hills and an entire generation has grown up knowing displacement as ordinary life, a small room in Camp 6 is quietly attempting to preserve something many fear could gradually disappear: memory.
On shelves and walls inside the newly established Rohang Heritage Center, old citizenship documents, faded photographs, historical maps, coins, handwritten materials, and linguistic records have begun to accumulate. Each item carries fragments of a past that many Rohingya refugees worry younger generations may no longer fully know or understand.
For the organizers behind the initiative, the center is not simply an archive. It is an effort to protect identity itself.
Preserving a History at Risk of Disappearing
The Rohang Heritage Center was established in Ukhiya’s Camp 6 amid growing concern that prolonged displacement is weakening younger Rohingya generations’ connection to their historical roots, language, and cultural identity.
Most children inside the camps today have little or no direct memory of Myanmar. Many were born in displacement or arrived at very young ages after fleeing violence in Rakhine State. Their daily lives are shaped almost entirely by camp realities: narrow pathways, temporary shelters, humanitarian distribution lines, and restricted movement.
Organizers of the center say this prolonged separation from homeland and history has created an urgent need for preservation.
The collection now housed inside the center includes Myanmar-issued citizenship documents dating from 1948 to 2017, archival photographs of mosques in Arakan, historical maps, linguistic materials connected to the Rohingya language and script, and various historical artifacts linked to community life in Rakhine State.
For supporters of the initiative, these materials represent more than historical objects. They are presented as evidence of the Rohingya community’s longstanding historical presence in Myanmar.
A Space for Learning Beyond the Camps
Alongside the archival collection, the center also functions as a learning space for Rohingya children and youth.
Weekly sessions are held inside the center focusing on cultural education, historical awareness, and discussions surrounding Rohingya heritage. Organizers say additional materials continue to be collected and documented as the initiative expands.
The atmosphere inside the space contrasts sharply with the uncertainty surrounding life outside it. Children sit reading documents connected to places they have never seen. Young people study maps of villages their parents still describe from memory.
For many participants, the center offers something rarely available in camp life: continuity with a past interrupted by displacement.
An Initiative Built Within the Camps
The project was developed through local coordination inside the refugee camps rather than through international NGO funding structures.
According to officials involved, the initiative was launched under the coordination of Camp-in-Charge Gazi Shariful Hasan with support from the office of Refugee Relief and Repatriation Commissioner Mizanur Rahman, alongside participation from educated Rohingya volunteers living inside the camps.
Authorities confirmed that the project does not involve direct funding from international non-governmental organizations.
This detail has drawn attention because many camp-based initiatives are heavily dependent on external humanitarian support. In contrast, organizers present the Rohang Heritage Center as a locally coordinated effort focused specifically on cultural preservation.
“We Are Not Just Refugees”
One sentence displayed prominently inside the center has circulated widely across social media platforms:
“We are not just refugees; we also have a history.”
For organizers, the statement captures the broader purpose of the initiative.
Displacement often reduces communities to humanitarian categories defined by crisis and dependency. The center attempts to push back against that reduction by emphasizing historical continuity, identity, and collective memory.
Speaking about the initiative, Camp-in-Charge Gazi Shariful Hasan said the project emerged partly from concern that younger Rohingya generations know little about the places and histories connected to their families.
“Many Rohingya from the new generation do not know where they came from. They have only seen camp life,” he said.
According to him, the center aims to reconnect younger refugees with their historical roots and cultural background.
Identity, Memory, and Repatriation
Refugee Relief and Repatriation Commissioner Mizanur Rahman described the initiative as part of broader efforts to preserve Rohingya cultural and historical awareness among younger generations.
He noted that additional exhibition spaces are also being planned, including a photo-based cultural center supported by BRAC University.
According to him, preserving cultural identity is important not only for historical reasons but also for future repatriation discussions. In this view, memory itself becomes connected to the long-term question of return.
For many Rohingya refugees, the fear is not only permanent displacement. It is also the gradual erosion of language, historical knowledge, and collective identity over time.
The longer exile continues, the greater that concern becomes.
The Politics and Importance of Cultural Preservation
The initiative has also generated broader discussion about the relationship between cultural preservation and political narratives.
Human rights advocate Tariq Hossain Mithul emphasized that protecting language, historical memory, and cultural identity remains essential for displaced communities. According to him, the loss of collective memory can deepen vulnerability over generations.
At the same time, some observers have noted that heritage initiatives in conflict-affected settings may intersect with wider political questions surrounding recognition, identity, and representation.
Istiaq Raihan, a faculty member at Jahangirnagar University, argued that preserving identity should not automatically be viewed negatively if such efforts contribute to safeguarding vulnerable communities and maintaining historical continuity.
Within the Rohingya context, these discussions carry particular weight because identity itself has long been contested politically inside Myanmar.
For many Rohingya, documenting history becomes inseparable from defending existence.
An Archive Against Erasure
The Rohang Heritage Center emerges at a time when the future of Rohingya repatriation remains deeply uncertain.
Inside Myanmar, conflict continues across parts of Rakhine State involving the Arakan Army and Myanmar’s military authorities. Questions surrounding citizenship, safety, governance, and freedom of movement remain unresolved.
Meanwhile, a new generation of Rohingya children continues growing up in exile.
For supporters of the center, this creates a profound concern: that prolonged displacement could eventually weaken connections to homeland, language, and collective historical identity.
The center therefore functions not only as a storage space for documents and artifacts, but as a response to the fear of cultural erasure.
Inside the camps, where daily life is shaped by uncertainty and temporariness, the preservation of memory becomes an act of continuity.
For many Rohingya refugees, the center represents an effort to ensure that displacement does not gradually erase who they are, where they came from, and the history they continue carrying across generations.
