Ana Vaz Milheiro interviewed in Visão Magazine regarding the ArchLabour Project

Ana Vaz Milheiro, integrated researcher at DINÂMIA’CET-Iscte, was interviewed in the 19 March 2026 edition of Visão magazine regarding the research project ArchLabour: Architecture, Colonialism and Labour. The role and legacy of mass labour in the design, planning and construction of Public Works in former African territories under Portuguese colonial rule.

In this interview, the researcher discusses the objectives and preliminary findings of the project, which received €2.5 million in funding from the European Research Council (ERC).

ArchLabour seeks to understand the mass labour contribution in Portuguese Colonial Public Works, in order to shine a spotlight on these invisible workers, thus establishing a connection between historical subalternity and the inequality that still haunts communities inheriting this past.

Through the study of the diverse colonial experiences of the African countries that have Portuguese as one of their official languages (Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, São Tomé and Principe, Angola and Mozambique), and covering a wide period from the modern colonization that begins after the Berlin Conference through the industrial capitalism’s exploitation praxis up to the years immediately following African independence, the project will cross the history of colonial architecture and the subject of Labour, with the history of Science applied to construction and post-colonial studies in architecture.

We invite you to read the full article in the 19 March 2026 print edition of Visão magazine to learn more about the impact and discoveries of this significant scientific work.