The Native and the Refugee | Film Screening and Discussion

© UNRWAThe Native and the Refugee is a multi-media project profiling the American Indian reservation alongside the Palestinian refugee camp. Directed by Matt Peterson and Malek Rasamny, the project has produced more than a dozen short films focused on peoples and places ranging from the Lakota of Pine Ridge to the Bedouin of the West Bank. Filmed from 2014-2019 throughout North America and the Middle East, their films and presentations address the significance of the land—its memory and divisions—and the conditions for life, community and sovereignty.

By examining the infrastructure, politics, and geography of American Indian reservations alongside Palestinian refugee camps, the goals of the project are to understand the centrality of the question of territory for any conception of autonomy; to look at the camp as an “extra-national” space with all the contradictions entailed; and to meet with those getting organized politically in these places to understand their communal concerns.

The Native and the Refugee has been presented in Canada, Ecuador, England, France, Guatemala, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Portugal, Syria, and the United Arab Emirates, including within refugee camps and reservations themselves, and at venues including cinemas, galleries, and universities.

More information is available here: https://thenativeandtherefugee.com/

ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS

Matt Peterson is an organizer at Woodbine, an autonomous space in New York City. He directed a film on the Tunisian insurrection, Scenes from a Revolt Sustained, with a production grant from the Doha Film Institute. His films and videos have screened at venues including Anthology Film Archives, e-flux, the Film Society of Lincoln Center, and MoMA PS1. He was a member of the collectives Red Channels and the 16 Beaver Group.

Malek Rasamny is a researcher, writer, speaker and filmmaker based in Beirut and Paris, whose writings have been published in The Daily Star and Fuse. He’s worked at the Maysles Documentary Center, and was a founding member of the LERFE space in New York City and Red Channels.

Contact

Please direct enquiries to Dr Dilar Dirik at dilar.dirik@lmh.ox.ac.uk 

Photo: Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in 1948. Credit: UNRWA