Images of immigration and refugee experiences rarely include their voices and this roundtable will reflect on different approaches to reframing, raising awareness of and centring immigrant stories.
Join us for a roundtable, chaired by Dr Sundhya Walther, with contributions from History (Prof Ana Carden Coyne), the Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute (Phoebe Shambaugh) and Drama (Dr Ali Jeffers) at The University of Manchester, who will discuss their projects, including the Traces of Displacement exhibition at the Whitworth Art Gallery, which opened in April 2023, and can be viewed until 7 January 2024.
This event marks the launch of The Walking Inquiry exhibition in Manchester, which brings together the voices and insights of people with lived experience of immigration detention and Volunteer Visitors who provide support to people in detention. The project engaged a unique methodology, building on walking, talking and sharing together. The contributions, which took various forms, including testimony, art, letters, video and poetry, shine a powerful light on the daily realities of immigration detention, and its complex and enduring impacts.
Following the roundtable, join us for a film screening and discussion about The Walking Inquiry exhibition. You will have the opportunity to hear from the Gatwick Detainees Welfare Group, the University of Kent (David Herd). The event will feature a film screening of a short film by Ridy Wasolua, featuring conversations with people with lived experience of detention.
The Walking Inquiry exhibition will be exhibited in the Samuel Alexander building ‘Glass Corridor’ space, and available to view between 25-27 April 2023, when the building is open.
Speakers
Ana Carden Coyne is Professor of History and Director of the Centre for the Cultural History of War (CCHW) at The University of Manchester. She is currently leading on a major AHRC research project, Understanding Displacement Aesthetics and Making Change in the Art Gallery with Refugees, Migrants and Host Communities (2021-24). Ana’s main research interests include the history and impact of displacement on artists and the use of the arts in building community resilience and contemporary art gallery transformations in advancing community access and displaced artist opportunities, children's experiences of war and displacement and the cultural impact of war, including children, young people and heritage.
David Herd is a poet, critic and Professor of Modern Literature. He has published widely on Twentieth-Century and Contemporary Literature and for the past ten years his work has focused on the intersection between literature and human rights. David is one of the organisers of the Refugee Tales project, on which he collaborates with Anna Pincus and colleagues at the Gatwick Detainees Welfare Group. Through that work he has helped articulate the call for an end to the UK’s policy of indefinite detention.
Alison Jeffers is a Lecturer in Applied Theatre and Contemporary Performance in the Drama Department at The University of Manchester. Alison Jeffers's research interests include: cultural democracy; applied theatre practice and research methodologies; participatory theatre with marginalised groups; community arts history and practice; performances of citizenship and belonging. Her practical interests include storytelling and adaptation in performance, site specific practices and autobiographical performance. Between 2005 and 2010 she undertook drama work with refugees and asylum seekers who are survivors of torture at Freedom from Torture in Manchester.
Phoebe Shambaugh is a PhD candidate at The University of Manchester in the Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute (HCRI). She received her MA in Anthropology and Sociology at the Graduate Institute in Geneva (2018) and BA from the University of Chicago (2013). Alongside her Phd research, she is currently the Managing Editor for the Journal of Humanitarian Affairs, published by Manchester University Press, and has previously worked in and around the aid sector, including with ACLED, the ICRC, and NORRAG.
Dr Sundhya Walther is a Manchester academic whose research focuses on multispecies interactions in postcolonial literature, with a special concentration in contemporary South Asia. Her book Multispecies Modernity: Disorderly Life in Postcolonial Literature (Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2021), locates techniques of identity formation in relationships between animals and humans in Indian writing from the late colonial period to the present day.
