Workshop: Navigating from education to employment in crisis and uncertainty

Zoe Jordan writes:

Young people’s position in the labour market is increasingly precarious and uncertainty is an ever-present dimension for young people living in protracted displacement and other crisis settings. Over the last decade, much progress has been made in developing frameworks to provide education in crisis. However, there is currently limited research examining the relationship between education and employment prospects in such contexts.

As part of the ESRC/GCRF and IDRC funded research programme “From education to employment. Trajectories for young people in Lebanon and Jordan in the context of protracted displacement”, CENDEP, in collaboration with the Centre for Lebanese Studies (CLS), is hosting an international workshop responding to the need for greater insight into young people’s trajectories from education to employment in crisis settings from 28 – 29 April 2020. Preliminary findings from the research programme will be presented, and we invite researchers and policy makers working in other contexts of uncertainty to join us to share insights, analytical approaches, and empirical realities.

We will be questioning education and employment strategies among young people and their families in the context of crisis; intersectionality and its workings in young people’s trajectories, focusing particularly on legal status, gender, disability, class and other social positions; the relevance of education for employment in the context of protracted displacement; and how young people are categorized and conceptualised, and its implications for policy and practice.

Paper presentations (15 – 20 minutes) and interventions for a roundtable discussion (5 minutes) are invited. Please send short abstracts (up to 200 words) indicating which format you would like to present, to Zoe Jordan (zjordan@brookes.ac.uk) by 17 March 2020.

To find out more: https://www.brookes.ac.uk/about-brookes/events/navigating-from-education-to-employment-in-crisis-and-uncertainty/

Work in Progress: Heteronormativity and intersectionality within humanitarian responses and campaigns

The speaker at this Thursday's Work in Progress seminar will be Hadi Damien of Beirut Pride. Hadi will reflect on his experience in Lebanon and working for LGBTIQ+ rights in the context of economic recession, protracted refugee crisis and the ongoing revolution. 

Hadi states in his personal reflections that “I use the verb ‘to understand’ instead of acknowledge, tolerate and accept.” He rejects the expression of sexual minorities because of the heteronormativity that it indicates and suggest that we must move away from hierarchies of identities. With these insights also come the need to discuss politics of representation and, for Hadi, this mean, rejecting the word ‘representation’ because how can we represent another person’s identity? Who can speak for others, and how can we make it possible to create a platform where experiences can be shared rather than represented? 

It is in the process of creating this platform that we must also ask: How can change happen, how we can support each other through initiatives that may help to make change? Beirut Pride is an example of such an initiative that is making change: a multisectoral and multi-partner approach that can address the manifold aspects of the LGBTIQ+ file. Pride is an example of visibility which is key to deconstruct myths, lies and prejudice that surround the LGBTIQ+ file: “a framework that brings several sectors to work together such as the executive sector (government, ministries, security agencies and their respective directions), the legislative sector (parliament, members of parliament and relevant committees), the judiciary sector (general prosecution, judges and courts), the academic sector (universities, schools, institutes, research centers and institutions of learning), the civil society (LGBTIQ+ people, key populations, opinion makers, celebrities, their fanbase, NGOs, social and political organizations (unions, syndicates), religious institutions, the silent majority, the critical mass, the general public, elected officials, present politicians, and the Lebanese diaspora), the human rights structures (OHCHR, IE-SOGI, HR Defenders, European Court for HR), the corporate world (businesses, insurance companies, employment and labor laws), the development partners (international programs, international NGOs and embassies) and the media (TV, radios, Portals, newspapers, advertisement, storytelling, etc).”

Hadi continues: “The goal is to multiply the shared, common spaces where people can be, where they can express themselves, where they are seen, where they can speak, where they are heard, where their contribution is noted. We often seek to develop procedures and methods to be able to include the others - I trust it is time we focus on deciding to include people, and then the procedures and methods will be organically developed. It’s the practice that produces theory.” 

The potential of moving mountains and creating change through Beirut Pride is then ultimately to accept that may not strive for ‘safe spaces’ but ‘brace spaces’: ‘safer spaces’ “where you get emotional and mental support to fight your battles, a few of which you share with people who go to this same brave space. The intersectionality of the LGBTIQ+ file, the way our layers interlace and affect each other, renders unique every one of our experiences, and therefore, there is no one, common, global battle to fight or one safe space to build. Each one of us requires our own customized safe space to recollect thoughts, to recharge energy, to get support, and then go back to all the spaces, safe or not, and make them inclusive.”

The seminar is at 16.30-18.00 on Thursday 27 February in room JHB303 in the John Henry Brookes building, Headington Campus. (The full list of seminars for this semester is here - but please note that the seminar on 12 March has been postponed until the autumn.)

Please get in touch with the Oxford Human Rights Festival (OxHRF@brookes.ac.uk), if you would like to read some of Hadi’s reflections before the seminar.

Work in Progress: Being a researcher in stigmatized communities - insider and outsider reflections

Fatima Hashmi writes about her Work in Progress seminar on Thursday: The presentation aims to provide some reflections of my doctoral research in stigmatised communities and highlight my positionality as an insider and outsider. These elements fit into this study, the fact that I conducted two fieldworks, where I was an insider in Pakistan and an outsider in Colombia. Belonging from the Hazara community, I had first-hand knowledge of the language, habits and customs, explicit and implicit routines and rules of functioning. Whereas, I had the lack of knowledge of the multiple types of Afro-descendant populations in Cartagena as well as language barrier. I show how these positionalities played a role in the research process; from the preparation by contacting the experts on Afro-descendants and Palenqueros prior to conducting fieldwork, which was not replicated to the same extent in the case of the Hazaras; to the process of gatekeepers’ recruitment in both sites, which were also different but what remained the same were the research methods that were employed in both sites. I reflect on my outsider positionality in Cartagena with shared experiences, such as forced migration and belonging to ethnic group and my insider position as a mix of Hazara (Shia) and Punjabi (Sunni), where my positionalities started to become somewhat blurred.

I also highlight the methodological and ethical considerations in both communities, where more familiarity as an insider and the risk of ‘repercussion’ on my family and its reputation, I was more aware so as not to disrespect the elders with my questions as well as why some were chosen for life-history interviews and others were not. Born and raised in the Hazara community, the participants assumed I knew exactly what they were talking about. Whereas, as an outsider, although I had the general knowledge of the context and the history of armed conflict in Colombia, the Afro-descendant community in Nelson Mandela neighbourhood felt it was necessary to educate me about their specific regions of displacement and their own experiences of forced migration through the process of truth and dialogue. Whereas, for the Palenquero community (originating from San Basilio de Palenque, the first free town of the Americas) in San Fernando, the community leader did something similar by taking me to visit San Basilio de Palenque to witness first-hand where they come from, their rituals and traditions. I was reminded throughout my fieldwork to be mindful how I narrate their history, rituals and traditions. In both cases, reflective thinking throughout the process of data collection and analysis helped to keep enough distance so as (1) not to miss the object by being too far or (2) ignoring it by being too close.

However, I question whether my positionality is risking to bring bias in my research? I conclude with reflecting on whether the positionalities of the researcher have to be within the set boundaries of an insider and an outsider or is there a space between that is blurred?  Or maybe were they evolving during the research process? Is it influencing the way I am looking at the data today? Or because of the blurred boundaries, now I look at both data the same way, simply as a researcher and not as an insider or an outsider. The seminar is at 16.30-18.00 on Thursday 20 February in room JHB303 in the John Henry Brookes building, Headington Campus. (The full list of seminars for this semester is here.)

CENDEP at the Peace Summit 2020

Two DEP students, Lindsay Slark (2018-20), centre, and Dina Black (2018-19), right, attended the Second Peace Summit for Emerging Leaders in Bangkok this month. Here they reflect on the experience.

“My name is Lindsay Slark and I am here representing Oxford Brookes University, United Kingdom.”

As the red light flickered and the mic turned off, I suddenly felt a sense of pride. I am at the United Nations and I am here representing something so much bigger than myself.

Neighbourly humanitarianism: Volunteering as intimate politics against Australia’s asylum regime

Tess Altman from the University of Southampton writes about her Work in Progress seminar on Thursday:

Volunteer humanitarianism by ordinary citizens in support of migrants facing hostile deterrence policies has become an increasingly common feature of the global humanitarian landscape. In this talk I focus on volunteer humanitarianism for people seeking asylum in Australia, a country with one of the most hostile deterrence regimes in the world towards people seeking asylum arriving by boat. Based on ethnographic fieldwork with humanitarian NGOs and volunteers providing services during 2015-16 in Melbourne, I discuss two standout features of their volunteer humanitarianism: a deep ambivalence with unequal relations, leading to humanitarian discourses of need being replaced by equalising cultural tropes such as neighbourliness and fairness; and the proximate and personal nature of humanitarianism undertaken “at home.” Volunteer humanitarianism in this context was a form of intimate politics against Australia’s hostile asylum regime, that was also infused with a complex gendered and racialised everyday politics of helping.

The seminar is at 16.30-18.00 on Thursday 13 February in room JHB303 in the John Henry Brookes building, Headington Campus. (The full list of seminars for this semester is here.)

Arba Minch field trip - DEP students reflect 4

Arba Minch street scene

In our final post from the Arba Minch field trip, two more DEP students reflect on their experience, focusing on their visits to a police detention centre and prison:

James Machak Chany Liah writes:

This being my first time ever in the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, several questions with no immediate answers lingered in my mind, which of course kept me awake for the whole night of my flight from London to Addis Ababa. When the plane touched down at Bole international airport, even before proceeding to Arba Minch, my final destination, I was having an open mind and flexibility to accommodate all the new things my eyes came across. Beside the diverse natural resources and the hospitality of the Ethiopian people, what impressed me most was the nature in which police conduct themselves at the detention centres. I have seen a general improvement compared to other East African police. The Ethiopian police do not have machine guns, they are more professional, they receive us with a lot of professionalism. Despite general health problems such as lack of water and congestion inside the cells that were mentioned by the detainees to me. those are things to do with budgets which could be beyond the police control. The trip was very educative and interactive.

Work in Progress: Shelter self-recovery

The majority of people affected by conflict and disaster ‘self-recover’: they rebuild using their own resources with little or no support from outside agencies. In the context of ever-increasing need for humanitarian assistance and grave constraints on humanitarian funding, there is an imperative to understand how communities self-recover and how best to improve support for that process.

At the first of this semester’s Work in Progress seminars, Bill Flinn (CARE International UK) will be introducing the ‘Self-Recovery from Humanitarian Crisis’ project, a research collaboration between CENDEP and CARE, with other humanitarian partners. Funded by a Global Challenges Research Fund Translations Award grant, this project aims to understand the priorities and agency of individuals, families and communities who are rebuilding their lives after natural disaster and conflict. The project will co-develop best-practice guidance for the support of that self-recovery process and investigate the wider impact of shelter humanitarian interventions, using longitudinal and action research fieldwork in Indonesia, Venezuela and Malawi. The guiding principles of the project’s research are that:

• ·       Self –recovery is an inevitable process. So we need to understand how best to support this process.
• ·      The agency of families and communities is of paramount importance. They have a right to choose and their priorities will vary from family to family and also over time.
  

Bill will elaborate on what his previous work with CARE in the Philippines after Typhoon Haiyan in 2013 taught him about the lived experience of people after disaster and how they prioritise their recovery pathways.

Charles Parrack (CENDEP) will discuss the importance of partnerships between academic institutions and humanitarian practitioners. Sue Webb (recent DEP student working as research assistant) will outline initial findings on the connections between shelter and health. The seminar will consist of a short presentation followed by open discussion of the themes introduced.
The seminar is at 16.30-18.00 on Thursday 6 February in room JHB303 in the John Henry Brookes building, Headington Campus. (The full list of seminars for this semester is here.)

Think Human - a world without torture

Friday saw the launch of the Think Human festival, a two-week series of artistic and academic events run by the Faculty of Humanities and Social Science. CENDEP's Richard Carver, along with Sushila Dhall, a psychotherapist from Refugee Resource, will be speaking at a Think Human event on Monday 3 February: "Fighting Torture: creating a torture-free world." Click the link for (free) tickets, or just turn up at the door: Abercrombie AB115a, 13.30-14.30.