The School of Media, Creative Arts and Social Inquiry, Curtin University & The Museum of Freedom and Tolerance, WA

Present:

ONE OF US? Complicity and Critique After The Christchurch Massacre.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has opened an official book of condolences for the victims of the Christchurch attacks with the words "they are us".

Radio New Zealand March 18, 2019

We, our, us, them are the most basic units of defining belonging and non-belonging. Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern chose to redefine these terms within her nation, claiming as kin the victims of the Christchurch massacre and disowning the killer. Yet, in other contexts, the killer was humanised, in line with his own self-representation as “an ordinary white man” -- someone who could be “one of us.” In the case of the 2011 massacre in Norway, author Åsne Seierstad notes that descriptions of the killer emphasized qualities that made him appear less like “one of us.”

Who are “we”? Who is “one of us”? Who are we part of? Whose humanity do we recognise as akin to ours?

In this symposium, community members, academics and artists consider the fraught term, one of us, exploring questions of the normalization of racism, everyday Islamophobia, and the connections between various forms of othering – “us and them” – in Australia.

We consider our complicities with violence and explore ways forward. A Q and A panel will address pre-submitted questions on how to recognize and resist the destructive identifications of us and them and the ways in which they are reproduced in our daily lives.

Featuring: Featuring:  Sky Croeser, Yahiya Ibrahim, Karim Jabbari (video), John Kinsella,  Marilyn Metta, Marziya Mohammedali,  Ayman Qwaider, Sabah Rind, Sara Saleh (video),  Kim Scott, Rabia Siddique,  Fadzi Whande, Yirga Woldeyes.

Convenors: Shaheen Hughes, Hannah McGlade, Marziya Mohammedali, Suvendrini Perera

Organizing Committee: Michelle Bui, Sky Croeser, Thor Kerr., Marilyn Metta, Baden Offord, Ayman Qwaider, Antonio Traverso

For Speaker bios, additional information and readings, please check here.

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We acknowledge the generous support of the State Library of WA