The Southern Eye: Co-Seeing Displacements delves into the layered and poignant experiences of refugees, intertwining photography and prose to explore themes of memory, identity, and belonging. The book is a collaborative effort, blending the perspectives of Palestinian poet Yousif M. Qasmiyeh, migration scholar Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, and photographer Saiful Huq Omi. Through powerful imagery and reflective narratives, the authors navigate the complexities of displacement, capturing moments that reveal the human condition in the face of loss and survival. This work not only documents the visible traces of refugee life but also evokes the unseen emotional landscapes that shape the lived experiences of those who are displaced.
Yousif M. Qasmiyeh is a Palestinian scholar and poet who was born and educated in Baddawi refugee camp and whose doctoral research at the University of Oxford examined containment and the archive in 'refugee writing.' His poetry and prose have appeared in journals including MPT, Stand, PN Review and Poetry London. His collection, Writing the Camp (Broken Sleep Books, 2021) was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation, and was shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature's Ondaatje Prize. His latest book is Eating the Archive (2023, Broken Sleep Books).
Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh is Professor in Migration and Refugee Studies at UCL where she co-directs the Migration Research Unit. She is Principal Investigator of Refugee Hosts and Southern Responses to Displacement, and Joint-Lead (with Yousif M. Qasmiyeh) of the Baddawi Camp Research Lab. Her books include The Ideal Refugees; South-South Educational Migration, Humanitarianism and Development; The Oxford Handbook of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies; The Handbook of South-South Relations; The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Contemporary Migration; and Refuge in a Moving World.
Saiful Huq Omi is a critically acclaimed photographer, filmmaker, educator, and activist. His photography, films and writing focus on human rights, politics of identity, and displacement. He has published over half a dozen books and has been working on and archiving the Rohingya crisis through photography for over a decade. In 2012, he founded Counter Foto - A Centre for Visual Arts in Dhaka, Bangladesh, which provides world-class photography education with a specialization in human rights and social justice.
