In this blog, I am sharing two more interviews that I did. The first is the founder of Huztory, an Instagram page that creates awareness about Pakistan’s history and culture on social media. He started this page in 2019 through Twitter as a result of growing up learning about other regions and wanting to represent his own, given the rich culture and history that Pakistan possesses. His work is very interactive and he gets a lot of responses on his social media about the unheard things he shares about Pakistan. I found his work very appealing as it shows the different ways in which representing one’s identity can be done.
I asked him, “What advice would you give to people who wish to contribute to the reclamation/promotion of Pakistan’s culture/Urdu language through products?”
I found his response to be very powerful and compelling, he said, “Material culture is one of the biggest representatives of culture and history as a whole. Handicrafts and cultural products have a reference to history in an unsaid way. When someone buys pottery from, say, Hala, they learn about it, its history/geography/culture, what its name indicates about it.”
He concluded by saying that Pakistan’s national identity is stronger and more cohesive than Pakistanis think it is and that this identity should be represented in tangible and intangible ways.
Another interview that I recently conducted was with an individual (who would like to stay anonymous) who co-founded a business selling the famous blue pottery of Multan, one of the oldest cities in Pakistan. She faced serious issues with getting consistent quality of the products, despite the artistic and cultural designs of blue pottery being so captivating. She claims that her experience shows that there is a huge demand for Pakistani cultural products such as blue pottery, in Pakistanis and non-Pakistanis alike. However, the issue of poor quality acts a hindrance in allowing individuals to celebrate and promote Pakistani material culture.