A Perilous Journey: Stories of Migration

PositiveNegatives in partnership with SOAS presents: A Perilous Journey: Stories of Migration

A Perilous Journey is an exhibition drawing upon a selection of PositiveNegatives rich ethnographic portfolio around refugee migration stories. Concentrating on contemporary real-life stories from Syria and Iraq, we follow two men and two women on their long difficult journeys fleeing conflict and persecution.

The exhibit includes Khalid’s, Hasko’s and Dana’s Stories detailing three separate harrowing journeys across Europe to reach safety from the conflict in Syria. Nadia’s Story tells of a pregnant Yazidi mother, fleeing ISIS controlled Iraq with her two young children. The literary comics explore the vulnerabilities and dangers men and women face while making these horrendous journeys. These vulnerabilities increase particularly with women travelling alone with young children, putting them at escalated risk of gender based violence.

About PositiveNegatives

Since 2012, the award-winning non-profit PositiveNegatives has been producing literary comics, animations and podcasts about contemporary social and human rights issues, including conflict, racism, migration, trafficking and asylum. Visual story-telling engages audiences of all ages, backgrounds and levels of literacy. Subsequently, Why Comics? Education Charity was set up in March 2016 to bring these vital humanitarian and social issues into schools across the globe. PositiveNegatives combine ethnographic research with illustration and photography, adapting personal testimonies into art, advocacy and education materials. Their work endeavours to combine literature, journalism, the arts and education. They have worked extensively with a range of international humanitarian, media and academic organisations and institutions.

About Why Comics? Education Charity

Based at SOAS Why Comics? are working with the University to humanise academic research to a wide audience. Baroness Valerie Amos, Director of SOAS; Liv Tørres, Executive Director, Nobel Peace Centre; and Peter Bouckaert, Director of Emergencies for Human Rights Watch are Patrons of Why Comics?

Why Comics? brings contemporary humanitarian and social issues into the classroom through interactive educational tools based on real-life testimony encouraging critical and reflective thinking on vital global themes, whilst encouraging learners to make connections between their own lives and lives of others throughout the world, promoting social change, and helping tackle racism and intolerance in schools. To date, over 550 schools in 27 countries have signed up to use their free interactive educational resources.

Organiser: PositiveNegatives in partnership with SOAS