| MIGRATION MATTERS, A WEEKLY REPORT |
Migration Matters looks at how, where and when the media (in all its forms) covers migration issues.
Hosted by FOMACS, and based in Ireland, Migration Matters has an Irish angle on events, but an international reach. We're interested in anything involving migration and the media, from striking coverage of migration stories in the international media, to local media production amongst migrant communities. The media could be print, audio, film, theatre, visual art... In other words, anything.
If you know of any media that we should be reporting, but haven't, do let us know. Contact us with your thoughts or suggestions at migrationmatters[at]fomacs.org.
Migration Matters is compiled by Colin Murphy. For articles by Colin Murphy, and more on migration issues, see the FOMACS print syndication project.
| migration matters Archive |
March 2010
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October 2000
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In a development of general interest to media watchers, some of the UK's leading investigative journalists have launched the Foundation for Investigative Reporting, and an associated Investigations Fund. 'Even before the onset of the recession, thousands of media jobs had been lost across Britain. The internet, digital television, falling advertising revenues and the commercial pressures of the 24/7 news cycle have all had an impact. While there continues to be great examples of courageous journalism, a growing number of news outlets are increasingly putting emphasis on entertainment, on rapidly-delivered and recycled news rather than the investigation and discovery of what the public wants and needs to know. 'Fundraising has yet to begin, but the Telegraph group has offered to make a contribution to start-up costs, and Google is to provide technical support and advice for free. Grey is talking to other media groups and is hoping to attract the interest of philanthropists or draw subscriptions from donors. A relatively modest budget of £500,000 could "transform things". The fund will, he hopes, give harried journalists the time to pursue the leads they are often forced to neglect. "Unless you have the resources or integrity to be able to spend a lot of money on something and still be prepared not to run anything, there's not going to be much integrity in your own investigation."' Under the heading, 'The Crisis', the Foundation outlines the current depressed state of the media business: 'Even as the practice of investigative journalism – the pro-active search for facts and explanations in the public interest – is squeezed and endangered by ever-greater commercial pressure, global trends make world events themselves ever more complex. The ‘story’ itself has got beyond what any individual investigator – be they a newspaper or media organisation or official agency – can investigate with their own resources. In the regulation of the corporate sphere, investigation is increasingly privatised under the guise of ‘self-regulation’ or ‘due diligence’.' And they note the following 'depressing trends': - 60 local papers in Britain have closed in the last 12 months, and over 4,000 jobs in the UK media went from July 2008 to January 2009, including the jobs of at least 1,000 journalists. The implications of these trends for reporting on the issue of immigration are clear: except in the scaremongering tabloids, migrant-related stories do not 'sell' papers. As Carol Coulter commented at the recent launch of new guidelines for reporters on refugee issues (see below), the media too often treats asylum stories simply as human interest ones, neglecting the stories and issues that do not have an immediate human interest angle and failing to subject the institutions of state and the justice system to adequate analysis. We wish the Foundation for Investigative Reporting well in its work. |
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After a number of false starts, the Office of the Minister for Integration, established in 2007, has launched a new, comprehensive website. Some content of note: Migration Nation: Statement on Integration Strategy and Diversity Management, from May 2008. This document is a Ministerial statement on the future direction of integration policy in Ireland. This Statement recognises that a key challenge facing Government and Irish society is the imperative to integrate people of different cultures, ethnicity, language and religion so that they become the new Irish citizens of the 21st century. Key statistics on immigration An archive of Press Releases Funding: Details of the (small) amount of funding disbursed by the Office in support of integration projects countrywide. Managing Diversity: A section containing comprehensive information on government policy and the international context. Useful Information for Migrants On the home page, John Curran, the Minister of State responsible, writes: 'The Irish people have vast personal experience of the challenges and opportunities that emigration and integration present as traditionally we were a country of emigration ourselves. Therefore, as a result of our own history, we understand emigration and the problems that emigrants can face. Uprooting your life, finding work, accessing services and building friendships in a new country can be a major challenge, even without the added complexities of cultural or language differences. 'In the 1990s, we saw a new, transformed Ireland emerge as a result of the economic success of the Celtic Tiger years. We became a destination-of-choice and over the past decade or so, many migrants have come here to live, work and study. 'By examining the official figures, we can clearly see the extent and indeed speed of this change - in 2002, approximately 5.7% of Ireland’s population of just under 4 million were immigrants while the 2006 Census figures show that over 10% of our population are newcomers and this represents an astonishing increase of 87% over the four year period. It is no overstatement to say that this has been a phenomenal demographic and social change for a small country to absorb over a relatively short timeframe. 'The 2006 Census figures show that we have over 420,000 migrants here who have come from 188 different countries and these people have a wide diversity of cultural and religious backgrounds. The level of migration we have experienced has brought both benefits and challenges but it is generally agreed that the benefits to Ireland have been substantial. Over the coming years, I expect that inward migration will continue to contribute to our labour force growth but that the level of immigration will not be as high as in recent years.' |
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The new Integration.ie website (as reported above) contains an 'information portal' on migrants and education developed by the Department of Education and Science. According to the introduction on the site, the portal contains 'links to information on the Irish education system, links to resources available for intercultural education, and links to organisations and institutions (in Ireland and abroad) conducting educational research on migration. It will be of interest to all sectors of education from pre-school to higher education and will provide information for policy makers, parents, teachers, researchers and others interested in migrants and their education in Ireland.' As a close reading of the above suggests, this is very simply a collection of links to bodies and information sources relevant to newcomers to the Irish education system. According to the website, this information is also available on the website of the Department of Education & Science. After some navigating of that site, I found a section on 'Newcomers to Ireland'. This is distinct from the information in 'portal' on integration.ie, and has an eclectic but potentially useful collection of documents and official statements relating to migrants and interculturalism in the classroom. |
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The launch of integration.ie coincides with that of integration.eu, a new European Union site on integration matters. Amongst the features of interest on the site are the following: Good practices: a selection of examples of good integration practice from all across Europe, submitted by those involved. (The criteria for selection and details of how to do so are here.) An information sheet on Ireland, which appears to be a comprehensive selection of links and documents on key aspects of integration policy. The PROMINSTAT database is a comprehensive inventory of statistical datasets on migration, integration and discrimination in Europe and currently contains descriptions of more than 1,200 statistical datasets. A facility to contribute and share information on integration. An extensive selection of information on national, European and private funding opportunities. A discussion forum that has clearly not yet gained any traction, but nonetheless provides a potentially useful facility. |
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A revised edition of the journalists' guidelines, 'Reporting on Refugees. Guidance by & for Journalists' was launched last week. The guide can be downloaded here. It is produced by the National Union of Journalists, the Irish Refugee Council and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The launch event was chaired by Carol Coulter of the Irish Times, and the panel consisted of the press ombudsman, John Horgan, the head of the NUJ, Seamus Dooley, journalist Abiba Ndeley, originally from Cameroon, and myself. Carol Counter's excellent contribution can be heard in this podcast from community radio station Near 90 FM and can be downloaded here. I will also publish the texts of the various contributions in subsequent posts. |
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The following is the advance text of Carol Coulter's remarks at the launch of the guide, 'Reporting on Refugees'. Carol Coulter is Legal Affairs Editor of the Irish Times. Others will speak of the need for accuracy, for a basic knowledge of what is involved in asylum-seeking, for avoiding stereotyping and the repetition of ill-informed and prejudiced comment, for treating asylum-seekers and refugees with courtesy and respect, so I won’t dwell on them. |
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The following is the text of Colin Murphy's remarks at the launch of the guide, 'Reporting on Refugees'. Colin Murphy is the editor of Migration Matters and an independent journalist covering immigration issues. I came into journalism relatively late. In early 2000, I found myself in Angola in Southern Africa, as an aid worker with an Irish NGO, where the main focus of our work was the people displaced by the Angolan civil conflict. When I came home, in 2002, and started writing, one of the aspects of Irish life that had changed most notably while I was away, and which I found most interesting, was demographics, and I gradually started to cover this as a journalist, initially with Village Magazine and, more recently, freelance. I’ve covered various insidious aspects of the asylum system, such as the iniquities of the Refugee Appeals Tribunal, the situation of unaccompanied minors, the disappearance of children from HSE hostels, and the direct provision system. I’ve also covered the exploitation of migrant workers and the denial of full rights to immigrant married couples. It can be tempting, covering these areas – particularly when meeting people whose lives have been terribly damaged through their suspension in the limbo of the Irish system – to be overwhelmingly negative about that system. |
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The following is the advance text of John Horgan's remarks at the launch of the guide, 'Reporting on Refugees'. John Horgan is the Press Ombudsman and is Emeritus Professor of Communications at Dublin City University. I am honoured to have been asked to formally launch this leaflet containing guidelines for reporting on refugees. The reasons will be obvious to everyone here. The first is that issues connected with the reporting on refugees will continue to arise, and may well arise even more sharply in a world increasingly characterized by financial meltdown, democratic deficits, and real threats to the life and limb of individuals and ethnic groups in an ever-increasing range of countries and regions. |
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The latest edition of the e-newsletter from Statewatch, 'Statewatch News Online', contains various items of interest to people working with migration issues. The full newsletter is here. You can sign up for it here. Statewatch is a NGO dedicated to 'monitoring the state and civil liberties in Europe', and attempts to fill the gaping hole in media coverage of the European Union as a political and institutional entity with rigorous analysis of EU documentation. Asylum issues feature regularly in Statewatch's commentaries, and the organisation published a useful study, 'Border Wars and Asylum Crimes', a few years ago. The newsletter is essentially a selection of links to new material on the Statewatch site. An excerpt follows. 1. EU: Major report on the: Criminalisation and victimisation of migrants in Europe (255 pages, pdf) directed by Salvatore Palidda. 2. EU: European Commission: Tracking method for monitoring the implementation of the European Pact on Immigration and Asylum (COM 266 2009): ... 20. Council of Europe: The European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) releases its Annual activity report for 2008. It highlights the main trends with regard to the presence of racism, xenophobia, antisemitism and intolerance across Europe. |
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This Saturday, June 20, is World Refugee Day. Below is a selection of links provided in the e-newsletter, 'Humanitarian Heads Up'. World facing new displacement crisis, says UN refugee chief - Emma Batha, AlertNet 'Humanitarian Heads-Up' is a very useful weekly bulletin provided by Reuters AlertNet as a service to journalists covering humanitarian crises and related issues. You can subscribe to it here. AlertNet is a 'humanitarian news network' established by Reuters as a philanthropic activity. Read about it here. It provides a suite of online services aimed at journalists. Amongst these are this YouTube video giving an introduction to crisis reporting, and an e-learning site with a range of online self-training packages. These include one on 'Reporting on refugees and displacement' - getting the facts right and explaining the stories behind the numbers' There is more on the background to AlertNet here. According to AlertNet, the site 'attracts upwards of ten million users a year, has a network of 400 contributing humanitarian organizations and its weekly email digest is received by more than 26,000 readers'. And on the background: 'During the Rwanda crisis of 1994, the Reuters Foundation became interested in media reports of poor coordination between emergency relief charities on the ground. It surveyed charities on what could be done to remedy this. The conclusion was that there was a need for a service that would: |
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Migration Matters has just stumbled across NowPublic, a 'participatory news network', or citizen journalism site, based in Canada, with a comprehensive array of content tools and an attractive and seemingly user-friendly interface. A search for 'asylum' on the site produces this list of stories, amongst them the story of a Sudanese asylum seeker who was murdered after being deported from the UK. According to NowPublic, the site 'mobilizes an army of reporters to cover the events that define our world. In twelve short months, the company has become one of the fastest growing news organizations with thousands of reporters in over 140 countries... By harnessing the wisdom of crowds and tapping into the news creating potential of the hundreds of millions of Internet users, bloggers and photography enthusiasts, NowPublic is changing the way news is made and distributed.' NowPublic was recently acknowledged as one of the top 20 Web 2.0 sites in Canada. According to the commendation: 'NowPublic is a crowdsourced media outlet. Sign up for an account and the site promises “You’re seconds away from publishing your news, your way.” If you’ve heard the term “citizen journalism” it’s because of companies like NowPublic. “This is a superbly thought-out and executed approach to crowdsourced news,” O’Connor Clarke said. “There are a lot of players in this space, but the way NowPublic have put things together, the way the site operates and their success in securing major partnerships with traditional media companies are all well worthy of recognition. NowPublic is a superb example of how 2.0 thinking can bridge the old and new media worlds to create something wholly new.” Other judges also raised the competition flag. Shuttleworth said there is “too much competition in this space” and Moffitt felt that “given its success already and its international scale, NowPublic could be creating an interesting form of new journalism, but it could also raise the hackles of well-moneyed competitors — but they have the head start.”' |
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A press release from South Africa alerts me to a new advocacy and public information project on trafficking, and to the role in it by a Cameroon-born South African musician, Wax. According to a recent article in the Sowetan, Wax began his humanitarian work in Hillbrow and Yeoville in Joahannesburg, areas of the city that are largely black and are now notable for their large numbers of African immigrants. He is now involved in anti-trafficking awareness work with the International Organization for Migration, which publishes 'Global Eye on Human Trafficking', available here. (Or you can download an issue directly here.) 'My new album is 'African Dream', and that is what it’s all about. The fact that you could see a child on TV and this child is desperate and hungry. Yes the child does need food, but it doesn’t end there, that child has a brain that could produce a business idea like Facebook, that could build a plane, that child could be anything because a child has that ability.' Wax's own website, with ample downloads and videos, is here. The 'bio' section contains an account of a fascinating life story. (Incidentally, in the course of researching this item, I came across the advocacy blog, 'The Human Trafficking Project', which may also be of interest.) |
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This week is Refugee Week in the UK (June 13-21), and amongst the events, theatre company iceandfire There is some video of the play here. Note that the company performs the play, as with their earlier 'Asylum Monologues', as a reading, with volunteer actors, with scripts in hand. There is a selection of reviews of the company's other work (all similarly political) here. Tour details are here. 'What sustains oppressive regimes such as Hitler's Germany, is not just the machinery of terror that holds them in place, but the disempowerment of an entire people through ignorance and poverty. It is this that allows a lumpenproleriat to build and bulwark such regimes. Access to information and humane living conditions alone set people free, enabling them to disengage from oppressive ideologies. In a society as ‘liberal' as ours in the UK, if we are to maintain more than lip-service to a just and cohesive society, this is still what is needed.'
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The FOMACS digital stories, 'Living in Direct Provision', will be screened at the Guth Gafa Documentary Festival in Donegal this weekend (Saturday June 13, 5pm). Full details are here. The Guth Gafa festival takes place every year (this is the third) in Gortahork, Co Donegal. |
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'What the Bible says about the Stranger. Biblical perspectives on racism, migration, asylum and cross-community issues' is a booklet by Kieran J O'Mahoney OSA, first published in 1999 in response to the then-new trend of immigration to Ireland, and republished this week in a revised and updated version, by the ecumenical Irish Council of Churches. It can be downloaded here. Eamonn Walsh, Catholic auxiliary bishop of Dublin and chairperson of the Irish Bishops Immigrant Council, launched it on Monday at the long-running Vincentian Refugee Centre in Phibsboro, Dublin. There will be a Belfast launch on Friday at 4pm at Edgehill Methodist Theological College. Amongst the points Eamon Walsh made were that “Any reference to people seeking asylum as irregular or, worse still, illegal migrants cannot be permitted or tolerated” and that recent changes to the work permit regime raised “major concerns”. |
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It was a disappointing election for most of the 40-odd immigrant candidates who stood in Ireland's local elections on Friday. Despite a surge in the vote for independents generally, independent immigrant candidates, such as Paddy Maphoso in Dublin, largely failed to take advantage. As Ruadhan Mac Cormaic in the Irish Times reports, 'former mayor of Portlaoise Rotimi Adebari was one of just three immigrant candidates to secure local authority seats at the weekend. (In fact, there was a fourth immigrant candidate elected: Anna Rooney, originally from Russia, took a seat on Clones Town
Council for Fianna Fail. Rooney was one of those featured in the recent
FOMACS print syndication articles for the Sunday Tribune and Le Monde Diplomatique. Her election was declared after the deadlines for Mondays' newspapers.) The Irish Times continued: 'Mr Adebari was joined by Dutch former aid worker Jan Rotte, who retained his seat for the Labour Party in Lismore, Co Waterford, and Kristina Jankaitiene, a Lithuanian school teacher who took a seat for the Green Party in Carrickmacross, Co Monaghan. 'Taiwo Matthew, an Independent from Nigeria, lost the seat he won in Ennis, Co Clare, in 2004.' Various other candidates came close to seats, notably Elena Secas, from Moldova, for Labour, in Limerick East. In Mulhuddart, three rival Nigerian candidates appear to have split any immigrant or Nigerian community vote, polling 15.4% in total but each failing to get elected, as the Times reports. The Irish Independent also reported on this issue, however that paper incorrectly reported that Katarzyna Gaborec, originally from Poland, had been elected for Fianna Fail to Mullingar Town Council. That article is here.
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Canadian investigative journalist Victor Malarek will be guest speaker at a seminar entitled, 'Sex Trafficking and Prostitution: The Dilemma of Demand' being jointly hosted by the Immigrant Council of Ireland and the Irish Human Rights Commission at Trinity College Dublin on June 23. There's an interview with Malarek here and a profile here. Victor Malarek is the author of “The Natashas” and “‘The Johns: Sex for Sale and the Men Who Buy It”. Other speakers include co-author of the ICI’s recent research report, “Globalisation, Sex Trafficking and Prostitution”, Patricia Kelleher; Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission Policy Advisor, Rebecca Dudley; IHRC Commissioner Rosemary Byrne and ICI Senior Solicitor Hilkka Becker. For further information or to book a place at the seminar, please contact ICI Anti-Trafficking Coordinator Nusha Yonkova at nusha@immigrantcouncil.ie or call 01 674 0202. |
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A short animated film by Siobhan Twomey of FOMACS has been shortlisted in the inaugural ICCL Human Rights Film School Competition, run by the Irish Council for Civil Liberties. Her film, 'Team Spirit', can be seen here. In the film, Sadiq, like so many refugees in Ireland, grapples with the fact that he must wait two years for his family’s visas to be processed, while his Grandmother has to remain in Darfur as she does not qualify under Irish law as a family member. All this while also being the star player in a football game against his team’s brutal arch rivals, the Bashers... Online viewers can vote for their favourite shortlisted film here. There's also a short documentary on the making of 'Team Spirit' here and more on the FOMACS animation project, run by Siobhan, here. |
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Migration Matters is delighted to publish the following guest contribution from Charlotte McIvor on the intriguing recent theatre production by Upstate Theatre Project entitled 'Journey from Babel'. Upstate Local’s first community-based initiative through their Louth International Theatre Project, ‘Journey from Babel’, was mounted from May 21-23, 2009, in Drogheda in the old Weavers’ Factory. This site-specific piece was written by a company of community members comprising eight nationalities who are currently living in Drogheda. ‘Journey from Babel’ was developed over a period of nine months in workshop rehearsals through the facilitation and, ultimately, direction of company founders Declan Gorman and Declan Mallon. ‘Journey from Babel’ led its audience members on a trip through time and space, addressing themes of migration from multiple perspectives. Audiences were issued a boarding pass with their programmes, and received a summary stamp as they hesitantly crept up a narrow stairway into an uncertain experience. Contemporary Ireland served as the anchor for the majority of the storylines, whether as origin point or final destination. Yet the play’s stories ranged from WWI-era Austria to the roaring 1920s in New York to 18th century Ireland. A hilarious and ribald Drogheda tea lady (Nicola Devine) shares performance space with lesbian newcomers to town from London and Quebec (Cara Brock and Shannon O’Donovan), while a French pilot (Sylain Pastor) threads his way through the crowd contemplating the philosophical reasons for flying at all, whether in the air or imagination. The plight of a pregnant new immigrant to Ireland named Anna, who is about to give birth in the airport, is considered (Maria Copley), as a childless woman named Marguerite (Jenny Thompson) is made redundant after 30 years of work and wonders why she has never been able to go anywhere at all, finally settling for at least leaving her husband behind. Multiple generations of women writing to lovers away at war are presented through the story of a German woman named Alicia, who experiences loss and rebirth as a new immigrant to the US (Doris Genner), while the global traffic of sex workers is briefly and boldly explored through the competing perspectives of an Irish woman in London, Rose (Bianca Browne), and a Hungarian woman in Ireland, Florka (Alexandra Pap). The whole show finally ends up on New York City’s Broadway, with the Drogheda tea lady, Alicia, and Anna sharing the stage space in hauntingly different roles before the cast appears for a candlelit vigil in honour of all those who have migrated to a new life for many different reasons. This dizzying collection of narrative threads and intersecting geopolitical issues would tire any theatregoer, especially one who has stood for the better part of an hour and a half, winding their way through a maze of rooms. ‘Journey from Babel’ engages with a litany of push-button issues, most extensively the recent furore over pregnant immigrant women coming to give birth in Ireland, which resulted in the 2004 citizenship referendum. At Anna’s first appearance, a scene in immigration control in which she is asked to hand over her visa is enacted over and over again without sympathy. By the time the audience is present at her delivery in the hospital, her pleas for an epidural turn into a plea for a free epidural, then social welfare, then a buggy, then designer shoes for her baby and so on. The scene ultimately dissolves into a pillow fight between the staff over whether this scene ever really happened, and whether the recession is the fault of the bankers or this woman and her baby. Meanwhile, Anna’s cries for help for her distressed baby are drowned out by the row. When Anna reappears with her baby buggy, it is to sing ‘Pirate Jenny’, from Brecht’s ‘The Threepenny Opera’, on Broadway. She belts out the haunting song about a female worker who dreams of being rescued by pirates who will kill her unjust employers. As the actor cradles her baby and sings to the audience, “And they pile up the bodies/ And I'll say: 'That'll learn you/ That'll learn you,'” it is unclear whether the piece is revising stereotypes of aggressive and violent women of colour, or using the Brechtian context and the song’s history as a US civil rights anthem via Nina Simone. This tension is the strongest feature of Upstate Local’s work here with ‘Journey from Babel’, and this section, as well as the stand-out performance from Nichola Devine as a well-meaning tea lady, who is continually frustrated by her straight talk being taken as racism when, “sure isn’t me daughter dating a black fellow, and he’s a lovely lad,” save the piece from pedanticism with their humour and striking theatricality. The successes and shortcomings of ‘Journey from Babel’ dramatise anew the problems that community-based performance presents for theatre criticism. The performances here are uneven, the transitions often tedious in a small space with many audience members, and the piece frequently feels strained by its epic scope. Yet, the staging of the piece manages to be site-specific in more than name only, utilising the unique architecture of the Weavers’ factory to not only create a world, but multiple worlds in the same rooms. And, most significantly, this piece is brave enough to push the audience literally into the same space with many issues that have received far too short a shrift in Irish performance spaces in the wake of the Celtic Tiger. It is also a piece that evolved through nine months of continuous contact between a group of community members with diverse opinions and points of origins, many of whom had never set foot on a stage before. Upstate Local’s work with ‘Journey from Babel’ makes a strong case for more flexible models of theatre criticism in Ireland that can accommodate appreciation and support for this kind of work. ‘Journey from Babel’ ultimately demonstrates an impressive willingness to use a theatrical process to interrogate the questions most commentators agree Irish arts should be asking, as well as take risks aesthetically and theatrically. Charlotte McIvor Charlotte McIvor is a PhD candidate in Performance Studies at University of California, Berkeley where she teaches courses in acting and writing. Her dissertation explores contemporary Irish performance that engages issues of race, immigration, and cultural belonging. She recently worked with the City Fusion Project as part of the St Patrick’s Festival in Dublin. A further article by McIvor, analysing actress Ruth Negga’s performance in Neil Jordan’s 2005 film, 'Breakfast on Pluto', is here. 'Journey from Babel' ran from May 21-23, 2009, at the Old Weaver’s Factory, Drogheda, and was presented by Upstate Local: Louth International Theatre Project. |
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Ireland's leading research institute has just released a new report on how schools are adapting to diversity. 'Adapting to Diversity: Irish Schools and Newcomer Students', published by the ESRI, is the first national study of school provision for newcomer
(immigrant) students. It draws on a survey of 1,200 primary and
second-level schools as well as detailed case-studies of twelve
schools. Its main findings are as follows: The vast majority of second-level schools have newcomer students. In contrast, four in ten primary schools have no newcomers while there are a number of primary schools with quite high concentrations of newcomers. The report can be downloaded here. Launching the report, integration minister John Curran noted that 'the majority of principals - and especially those from DEIS (Department of Education & Science) schools - report that academic achievement levels among newcomer students are at least as good as those among Irish students'. He concluded by saying that newcomer students were 'a very positive addition to our schools, presenting an opportunity to enhance outcomes for all students and an opportunity for society as a whole. While there are challenges to be addressed, this report shows that with a positive school climate, it is possible to meet these challenges.' |
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'I'll be counted among those who tried to make a difference,' said Paddy Maphoso, an independent candidate in the local elections in Dublin, from South Africa. 'In 2009, I stood out and tried to make a change.' Maphoso spoke to me for an article for the FOMACS print syndication project, which was published on Sunday in the Sunday Tribune. (An international version will shortly be available in the June issue of Le Monde Diplomatique.) The Irish Times also had an article on immigrant participation in the elections this weekend. Ruadhán Mac Cormaic's article focussed on the parties' strategies for involving immigrants. Metro Eireann has a good archive of articles on various immigrant candidates. |
