For Sama: discussion with Afraa Hashem

 

EL Laskar writes:

On 10 December the 19th Oxford Human Rights Festival in collaboration with the Oxford Brookes Documentary club screened the award winning documentary 'For Sama' which was followed by a Q & A with Afraa Hashem. FOR SAMA is both an intimate and epic journey into the female experience of war. A love letter from a young mother to her daughter, the film tells the story of Waad al-Kateab's life through five years of the uprising in Aleppo, Syria as she falls in love, gets married and gives birth to Sama, all while cataclysmic conflict rises around her. FOR SAMA is the winner of many awards including the BAFTA for Best Documentary in 2020.

Recently settled in London with her family, Afraa Hashem is a teacher, human rights activist and is featured throughout the documentary.The Director of the Centre of Development and Emergency Practice (CENDEP), Professor Cathrine Brun talks to Afraa about her experiences as an educator, wife, mother and friend in a war zone. 

Find out more about the 19th Oxford Human Rights Festival 2021 here.

Refugia: a durable solution?

 

Nick Van Hear writes:

This blog is based on a contribution to the webinar hosted by CENDEP on ‘Rethinking solutions in never ending displacement: what are the alternatives?’  held on 1 December 2020.

I want to approach the question through an experiment in social science fiction that I have been engaged in with my colleague Robin Cohen over the past few years.  We have tried to imagine a new kind of transnational entity, called Refugia, that has tentatively established itself by the year 2030, against the background of continuing global turmoil and mass displacement.  Refugia is essentially the outcome of a socio-political movement of refugees and supporters which takes off in the early 2020s in the face of the failure of the durable solutions and the wider refugee regime to provide solutions to mass displacement on the scale needed. The transnational entity has been built up incrementally from the transnational practices of refugees and other people on the move. 

Education in Emergencies: five critical points for shifting power

 

An informal school for Syrian children in Beirut (Photo C Brun)

Cathrine Brun and Maha Shuayb* write:

Over the past 20 years, efforts to include education in humanitarian response, framed as Education in Emergencies (EiE), have been quite successful. However, EiE work and its conceptualisation are fraught with challenges. Arguably, there has been insufficient critique of the field. Here, we present five points of critique of education in emergency based on our research experience in Lebanon. In conclusion, we suggest ways forward to address these gaps. 

Oxford Human Rights Festival events this week

The 19th annual Oxford Human Rights festival is upon us, with the theme of Disruption. The main festival will be next March, but please check out these three important and interesting events happening this week.

Quiz & Discussion 
Tuesday 8 DEC 2020
5pm - 6.30pm 
Orange The World -  Elimination of Violence against Women

As part of the UN Women International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women 2020, Basma El Doukhi will lead an interactive session to challenge assumptions and raise awareness around the facts of gender based violence.Click here for more info and booking >>

ONLINE SCREENING + Q&A 
Thursday 10 DEC 2020
7PM - 10PM
​'FOR SAMA' & Q&A 
​with Afraa Hashem

FOR SAMA is the winner of many awards including the BAFTA for Best Documentary 2020. Q&A with Afraa Hashem. 18 cert. In collaboration with Oxford Brookes Documentary Club and OxHRF.  Click here for more info and booking>>

ONLINE DISCUSSION
Friday 11 DEC 2020
5.30PM - 6.30PM (UK)
'Can the UK lead on climate change?
The CEE Bill and our future'

Join the CEE Bill Alliance Oxfordshire as we celebrate our climate change achievements locally and in the UK and discuss how we can continue to have strong climate leadership into the future. In collaboration with CEE Bill Alliance Oxfordshire. Click here for more info and booking>>