Season 2, Bonus Episode #1: Behind the Community Art Project

Season 2, Bonus Episode #1: Behind the Community Art Project

In this bonus episode, Grace Nuri, the artist behind the beautiful graffiti you encounter at our centers, reflects upon the significance of this community project.  The Community Art Project first started in the summer of 2023 and saw the completion of several outstanding mural pieces in both our centers. More recently, Grace came back to Amman to visit the city and her family and decided to develop the Community Art Project further following talks with the community about how there was a need for more representation, especially women’s representation. Written and hosted by Grace Nuri  Edited by Francesca Maria Lorenzini [https://francescamarialorenzini.com/about/]

Season 2, Episode 7: Community Empowerment

Season 2 (2024): Episode 7, "Community Empowerment" Many of our recent episodes have focused on policy…. Good policy, and bad policy, and the policies that need to change. But these are shifts that might take generations, and in the meantime, refugee communities don’t have the luxury of waiting.  For our final episode of Season 2, we bring our attention back to Jordan. We hear from Ricky and Hassan, the co-founders of a critical, anti-racist English as a Second Language program run by refugee-led organization Sawiyan, a partner of CRP. In the face of slow political change, how can community programs like Sawiyan’s equip people to be their own advocates? Background reading * Read more about Sawiyan’s ESL [https://sawiyan.org/about-the-program] program. * What is critical pedagogy, the education theory underpinning this program? Listen to this short explainer [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXUv7pIveMA].  * Make sure to catch this recent piece from Ricky and Sawiyan co-founder Dina Baslan, for Untold Magazine [https://untoldmag.org/reliving-it-at-a-distance/], about the continued displacement crisis unfolding in Sudan, and its reverberations in Jordan.

Season 2, Episode 6: The Border Inside: Notes from Belgrade and El Paso

Season 2 (2024): Episode 6, “The Border Inside: Notes from Belgrade and El Paso” It might seem strange for a podcast about displacement in the Middle East to suddenly pivot to two other continents. But that’s exactly what we’re doing here! In Belgrade, Serbia, Zach talks to his friend Zaki, who left Afghanistan to seek safety in Europe. And from El Paso, TX, USA, Zach speaks to Jesús de la Torre and Aimée Santillán of the HOPE Border Institute [https://www.hopeborder.org/] to reflect on what’s happening at the U.S.-Mexico border. The point of this journey is to see how migration policies around the world are interconnected. Too many governments have bought into the same erroneous philosophy: the idea that a security response can answer humanitarian and political questions. How can we rethink migration, and our policy approach to it, so that displaced people can restart their lives again, meaningfully and on their own terms?  Background reading * Host Zach Goodwin spent a year as a Fulbright scholar in Belgrade, Serbia, where he put together a collection of refugee oral histories, including a contribution from interviewee Zaki. Read the collection here [https://www.theworkshopbelgrade.org/_files/ugd/a8571b_5414bda4a81a423aa3554243f45e2c97.pdf?index=true].  * Curious to learn more about the journeys of Afghan refugees? Two books explore this in great detail: The Lightless Sky [https://www.andrewlownie.co.uk/authors/nadene-ghouri/books/the-lightless-sky-a-twelve-year-old-refugees-extraordinary-journey-across-half-the-world] by Gulwali Passarlay and The Naked Don’t Fear the Water [https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/15/books/review/the-naked-dont-fear-the-water-matthieu-aikins.html] by Matthieu Aikins. * This op-ed [https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/02/asylum-seekers-migrant-crisis/677464/?utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_content=true-anthem&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter] from The Atlantic dives into the narrative of the ‘migrant crisis.’ Is it really what politicians say it is? * Many asylum-seekers arrive in the U.S. and have no one to guide their entry. How can we change that? This white paper [https://www.hopeborder.org/_files/ugd/e07ba9_b72d83908acd4f02a5fc52c2789f970c.pdf] from HOPE Border Institute gets the ball rolling.

Season 2, Episode 5: On the Other Side of Waiting: The Long Path to Resettlement with Kitti Murray

Season 2 (2024): Episode 5, “On the Other Side of Waiting: The Long Path to Resettlement with Kitti Murray.” Most people registered as refugees in Jordan hope that, one day, they will be accepted for resettlement to countries in North America and Europe, where there are more viable paths to work and citizenship. However, last year, just 1.4% of Jordan’s refugees were accepted for resettlement. The laborious, time-consuming, and retraumatizing process can take years, and in the meantime, the uncertainty is enough to drive anyone mad.  In this episode, we talk to Kitti Murray, the CEO and founder of Refuge Coffee, which provides job training for newly resettled refugees in Clarkston, GA, USA, once described as “the most diverse square mile in America.” We ask Kitti: what lies beyond resettlement, in the early days of one’s new life?  Background reading:  * Did you know that Clarkston, GA, is the “most diverse square mile” in the United States? Read this profile [https://bittersoutherner.com/the-souths-ellis-island-clarkston-georgia-refugees] to learn more.  * Take a look at this 2017 New Yorker profile [https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/waiting-for-resettlement-in-the-age-of-trump] from journalist and CRP board member Tara Sutton, reported from the halls of CRP’s center, about 11 Syrian and Iraqi men caught in the interminable wait for resettlement. * Why is the Biden administration falling so short of its refugee resettlement targets? CBS News covered it here [https://www.cbsnews.com/news/refugee-admissions-target-2022-biden-administration/].

Season 2, Episode 4: Refugees and Jordan's Economy with Shaddin al-Masri

Season 2 (2024): Episode 4, “Refugees and Jordan’s Economy with Shaddin al-Masri.” To survive in today’s world, you need money. And to make money, you need a job. But this is not a simple proposition for Jordan’s 700,000 refugees, the majority of whom face exclusion from Jordan’s formal economy. In this episode, we talk to Shaddin al-Masri, a PhD student at Danube University Krems whose research focuses on nationality-based discrimination in humanitarian aid and labor market integration for refugees. We break down Jordan’s kafala sponsorship system, its uneasy relationship with refugees, and certain initiatives that have created limited paths for refugees to work. Given the academic nature of this episode, we hope the reading list below will help you get caught up to speed. Background reading: * The basic framework governing foreign labor in Jordan is the kafala system. But what is the kafala system [https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/what-kafala-system#:~:text=The%20kafala%2C%20or%20sponsorship%2C%20system,workers'%20employment%20and%20immigration%20status.], a private sponsorship structure predominant in the Arab world? * Around 2016, visits from academics and donors spurred conversations around economic self-reliance for Syrians in Jordan. These conversations [https://deeply.thenewhumanitarian.org/refugees/articles/2016/07/25/jordan-experiment-spurs-jobs-for-refugees] created groundbreaking, if fragile, employment schemes for Syrians.  * But this 2016 ‘compact’ only served Syrians and left other refugees in the dark. Shaddin wrote more about it here [https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/dpr.12734].  * Nowadays, limited entrepreneurship, cash-for-work, and volunteering programs provide refugees with economic lifelines — but for how long [https://www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/stories/cash-for-work-jobs-offer-temporary-lifeline-at-zaatari-refugee-camp/]?