Noah from Arts4Refugees talks with Ellie who is a student journalist with us. This placement was organised by Oxford University Career Services. Ellie is a third year studying classics and Arabic. The artist she researched is a comedian named Shaparak Khorsandi. She found the research interesting since the artist was a comedian, and got to watch some clips and listen to some podcasts of the artist.
Shaparak’s first show was called the silent speaker and she used her refugee background as source material. Born in Iran in 1978 she had to flee five years later. In her childhood memoir, she talks about having to adapt to a new culture fast which was a struggle.
You can listen to the full conversation here.
Key Points:
Ellie is studying classics and Arabic at Oxford
Shaparak's dad used to receive death threats in Iran and even after they fled to London they continued
She was determined to fit in when she was young and rejected her old lifestyle; later in life she embraced her heritage
She won the James Joyce Award in 2013
In 2014, she was awarded BBC’s top 100 women award.
If you would like to learn more about Shapark - there is a short story by Ellie here.
