Recontextualizing the audiovisual archive between dramatic creativity and memory documentation: The Egyptian series "Al Ikhtiyar 3" as a model.

The concept of archives and archival practices is closely linked to constructing historical knowledge and collective memory, as historians rely on written and oral documents for documenting events and recording memories. In the 1990s, new research interests explored the relationship between archives and performing arts, particularly cinema and drama, positioning them as competitors to traditional historical writing. This relationship garnered the attention of researchers and professionals in Western societies, who analyzed the impact of repurposing audiovisual archival documents on narratives of history and memory. They also framed various methods and practices among filmmakers within a theoretical framework considering archival science principles. One significant theoretical approach is recontextualisation.
This study highlights the concepts, characteristics, and components underlying the "recontextualization" approach and the forms it takes within artistic and television works. We apply this analysis to one leading Arab country in dramatic production, Egypt, where Egyptian dramas enjoy significant popularity among Arab nations, making recontextualization elements understandable for other societies. This study examines the series "Al-Ikhteyar 3" as an example of utilizing audiovisual archives in drama, where the director relied on diverse archival materials to document a critical period in Egypt's history between 2012 and 2013. This model clarifies the potential of audiovisual archives in documenting collective memory and reinforces its role as a competitive medium to historical writing within Arab societies.