Major report, ‘Development Approaches to Forced Displacement from Syria in Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq,’ published.

On the 3 November 2022 the UCL-Migration Research Unit at the Department of Geography published a major report on ‘Development Approaches to Forced Displacement from Syria in Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq.’ The report, led by Prof. Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, presents the findings of a state-of-the-art literature review of over 260 sources published between 2016–2021, synthesising existing…

Pádraig Ó Tuama in conversation with Yousif M. Qasmiyeh at the Wimbledon BookFest

Pádraig Ó Tuama and Refugee Hosts' writer-in-residence, Yousif M. Qasmiyeh, will be in conversation at the 50 Poems to Open Your World event at this year’s Wimbledon BookFest. This is an in-person event taking place from 5-6pm on Saturday the 24th of September 2022. More details, including ticket sales, can be found by clicking the…

Participatory Action Research as a decolonial method

'I was not interested in writing a step-by-step instruction manual to reinforce the myth that research methods are linear, simple, and neutral tools,' argues Prof. Caroline Lenette in this blog describing some of the motivations, thought processes, and challenges she encountered in writing her book Participatory Action Research: Ethics and Decolonization. Writing from her "perspective…

Women as hybrid hosts: Challenging the myth of host communities

The term 'host' is widely used but often unquestioned in relation to it's meaning in displacement and migration discourse and practice. 'Hosts' are often assumed to be the long established communities in to which refugees arrive, and yet, as we have been exploring in Refugee Hosts, this is not always the case. In this blog,…

Listening to Hamra: Ethical Considerations

In this post, Refugee Hosts Researcher, Leonie Harsch discusses a soundscape recorded in Hamra, Beirut and reflects on the ethical considerations associated with producing and disseminating recordings of displacement and its responses.  You can listen to the soundscape that accompanies this post below.  If you found this piece of interest, you can visit further soundscapes…

‘Writing the Camp’ shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize 2022

Refugee Hosts is delighted to announce that 'Writing the Camp,' the poetry collection written by Yousif M. Qasmiyeh during his work as the Refugee Hosts Writer-in-Residence, has been shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize 2022.  The RSL Ondaatje Prize is awarded by the RSL to 'an outstanding work of fiction, non-fiction or poetry that…

‘Writing the Camp’ selected as one of the Best Poetry Books of 2021 by The Irish Times

Writing the Camp - the poetry collection written by Yousif M. Qasmiyeh during his work as the Refugee Hosts Writer-in-Residence - has been selected as one of the Best Poetry Books of 2021 by The Irish Times, with Seán Hewitt praising it as a "vital sequence of poems... a remarkable collection." Writing the Camp was…

‘Writing the Camp’ Highly Commended by the Forward Prizes

Writing the Camp - the poetry collection written by Yousif M. Qasmiyeh during his work as the Refugee Hosts Writer-in-Residence - has been Highly Commended by this year's Forward Prizes, building on the collection having been selected as The Poetry Book Society's Spring 2021 Recommendation earlier this year, and named as one of ‘the best…

Yousif M. Qasmiyeh at the IASFM18 Conference

Refugee Hosts' writer-in-residence, Yousif M. Qasmiyeh, will read from his acclaimed poetry collection, 'Writing the Camp,' in conversation with Prof. Heaven Crawley, at the IASFM18 Conference 'Disrupting Theory, Unsettling Practice: Towards Transformative Forced Migration Scholarship and Policy.' 'Writing the Camp' is an essential collection drawn from Yousif's experience of the Baddawi refugee camp in Lebanon.…

Prof. Fiddian-Qasmiyeh & Yousif M. Qasmiyeh speak at Refugee Week ‘ReConnect’ Event

On Friday the 18th of June 2021, from 2pm - 5pm (GMT), Refugee Hosts' PI, Prof. Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh and writer-in-residence, Yousif M. Qasmiyeh, spoke at the ReConnect event 'Supporting Refugees into Higher Education'. Yousif M Qasmiyeh read from his acclaimed collection of poetry 'Writing the Camp' and Prof. Fiddian-Qasmiyeh critically discussed the notion of “voice”…