Refugees in the Middle East and North Africa: The Politics and Lived Experiences of Displacement

There are more than 123 million people displaced in the world today, many of whom hail from, or live in, the Middle East and North Africa. Why has this region experienced so much forced migration and what is the significance of these many layered movements? Nadia El-Shaarawi will discuss the contours of displacement in and from the region, with a focus on the politics of displacement and its effects on the people who live through it. We will explore histories of forced migration as well as the context and implications of displacement today.

Presenter Nadia El-Shaarawi is author of the book Collateral Damages: Tracing the Debts and Displacements of the Iraq War, published this year by University of California Press. This book, based on long term ethnographic fieldwork with Iraqi refugees in Cairo, Egypt, seeks to tell a different story of the 2003 US invasion of Iraq and the mass displacement it caused, one that centers the stories and experiences of Iraqis. Nadia teaches classes on displacement, migration, borders, humanitarianism, and health in Global Studies and Anthropology at Colby College.