Examines how cultural knowledge, language, identity and place are represented when AI systems are used to produce, interpret and circulate meaning. It brings together perspectives from cultural practice, creative production and critical research to consider what happens when living cultures become inputs, outputs and objects of interpretation within AI systems.
The session asks how AI can engage with local knowledge and cultural context without flattening difference or treating culture as a fixed dataset. It considers the responsibilities of those who develop, apply and shape these systems, and the conditions required for cultural representation to remain accountable to the communities it concerns.
Adel Miran
I am an Emirati AI and innovation leader with experience in real estate, facilities management, and transformation. I have researched AI since 2017 and AI governance since 2018, advocating responsible, human-centred innovation.
I serve as Director of Administration and Facilities Management at Dubai Holding Real Estate and Chief Commercial Officer at Neuratia Labs. I founded Miranco Innovation & AI Consultancy, advancing dialogue on cultural representation, integrated intelligence, and AI governance.
My achievements include an entrepreneur research award at World AI Expo Dubai 2025; Forttuna Global Excellence Awards 2025 honours as Visionary Leader of the Year in AI and Real Estate and Global 100 Legacy Maker; and recognition among the Top 100 in the Middle East for AI innovation.
I am honoured to join this summit as a keynote speaker, presenting “Cultural Sovereignty in AI: Beyond Words.” I champion AI that reflects local knowledge, heritage, and values with people at its centre.
Fatima AlKaabi
Fatima Al Kaabi is an Emirati inventor, engineer and creative technologist.
Salma Alkhoudi
Salma Alkhoudi is a Ph.D. candidate in the Anthropology of Science and Technology at Stanford University and a Knight-Hennessy Scholar. Her dissertation treats “intelligence” itself as an object of study, following how the concept gets built and bound into AI systems along the corridor between the Gulf and the Bay Area. Alongside her fieldwork, she has contributed to scholarship across several NLP and AI projects and labs in the Gulf, including continued pre-training on Arabic corpora.
Salma is also a founder whose work centers on conceptual reasoning. She asks what it takes for people to think well alongside machines, and whether AI widens or quietly narrows the range of ideas people are able to reach. She has spent seven years in AI strategy and policy across the Gulf, including as a Research Fellow at the Mohammed bin Rashid School of Government.