Silence written in policy: Global Compact on Refugees and LGBTIQ+ persons
Queer Displacements: Sexuality, Migration and Exile, Canberra, November 2019
2018 – Public Speaking
Paper presentation at the ‘Politics of Listening’ Conference
Sydney, November 2018
In this presentation I seek to reflect on the journey of working with 8 queer refugee women as a part of my PhD thesis What does it mean to be a queer refugee woman? A Collective self-discovery of lived experiences through trauma and agency. In this presentation I want to discuss how feminist and queer theorising of trauma has a potential to bring to surface those experiences that were silenced because of one’s gender, sexuality, and/or biopolitical governance of bodies in situations of exile and asylum-seeking. I also aim to critique current approaches to witnessing within refugee activism that result in re-traumatisation of people with the lived experience. In doing so, I attend to my position from within to reflect on the reciprocal listening to what our traumas open up.
2017 – Public Speaking
Panel Presentation: ‘Roundtable on gender equality: better protection for all refugees’
High Commissioner’s Dialogue on Protection Challenges, UNHCR, Palais des Nations, Geneva
My presentation focused on the need to adopt gender and diversity sensitive language and approaches to protection. Download the full speech here.