The Urban Ecology of Muscat City and Its Reflection on the Omani Cultural Identity

Mohamed, Hani Rabie Nadi

doi:10.21608/qarts.2023.243489.1782

The Urban Ecology of Muscat City and Its Reflection on the Omani Cultural Identity

Document Type : Original Article

Author

Hani Rabie nadi Mohamed

Lecturer - Geography Department Faculty of Arts - Beni Suef University

10.21608/qarts.2023.243489.1782

Abstract

Cultural identity or a sense of belonging to a group represents a kind of person's self-concept and theory of self-understanding, which relates to nationality, ethnicity, religion, social class, location, or any kind of social group that has its own culture. Globalization has contributed significantly to the elimination of local differences, which some peoples rejected and recognized by some other peoples. Despite the domination of globalization on many Arab cities, many of these cities have their own ecology associated with their cultural identity, which they acquired throughout their civilizational history.
The city is generally characterized by many criteria on the basis of which its different regions can be divided on the basis of socio-economic, religious and ethnic, which contributed to the difficulty of determining the scale used in the ecological division within cities. In the case of cities that receive immigrants such as the city of Muscat - the subject of the study - reliance on ethnic classification represents an important criterion in the process of dividing the city's neighborhoods, as the role of the immigrant does not stop at filling the society's need with the profession that society needs, but goes beyond that to direct influence In the cultural identity of the indigenous people, through the reflection of their special behaviors, customs, traditions, culture, religion and nationality on the inhabitants of those cities receiving immigrants. Perhaps the important question that the study revolves around is whether the non-Omani nationalities succeeded in forming their own environment with features that differ from the environment of the indigenous population? Was the cultural identity of the immigrant population reflected on the indigenous population? And the extent of their influence on the Omani cultural identity?

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