All photography provided by Jon Yee
Our Mission
Our mission is pretty simple: we just want refugees' voices and stories to be heard. To this end, we're producing a podcast, allowing refugees to share their stories without fear of being traced (only first names are used, and any identifying details are edited out), in the hopes of providing a platform for otherwise unheard voices. You might be thinking that you've seen a thousand news reports about refugees, read a hundred different articles about refugees, and that is probably true. But it can still be tough to find accessible, long-form, intimate interviews with refugees. Often refugees' stories are edited into soundbites, and the complexity of people’s experiences can be lost.
““No one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark.””
Why a podcast?
Audio feels personal, but is much harder to track than video. Some refugees may feel threatened by the idea of their image being distributed, particularly if they still have family back home who are in danger of potential violence. Many of our interviewees mentioned how important this was to them, and some had already experienced backlash from statements they made in video interviews in the past. Doing an audio only interview made them feel a lot safer and freer to speak.
For reasons of modesty, many women prefer not to be photographed or filmed, but are happy to have just their voice recorded. Sometimes the women who would typically avoid doing video interviews were interested in doing an audio interview.
Audio recording is easier, cheaper, and less intimidating for interviewees than video recording. The interviewees felt more relaxed, because they didn't have to worry about how they looked, the cleanliness of their living space, and could have as many support people around them as they wanted.