Arts project seeks experiences of people returning to Manchester
Article published: Sunday, November 27th 2011
A local arts project is seeking the stories of people who have left and then returned to Manchester. Dubbed (re)integration, the project aims to collect a diverse range of returnee’s experiences from all corners of the city and explore what is meant by feelings of identity and community.
Part of the Future Fires scheme at Manchester’s Contact Theatre, which supports emerging young artists, the project is asking volunteers to take part in filmed interviews for a video exhibition held in the city next February. If participants are willing they can also have the chance to take part in filming workshops where a cross section of stories and their tellers will be explored in greater depth.
Project Organiser Tania Mahmoud, who herself was born in Manchester but spent twelve years of her life abroad in Pakistan and Malaysia, said she was inspired by her own feelings of being “all over the place” upon her return to the city, something she attributes to “culture shock”.
Born in Manchester, but having spent twelve years of her life abroad in Pakistan and Malaysia, she returned to Manchester six years ago but found that four of these went by before she fully acclimatized and felt comfortable again.
Culture shock
Mahmoud says she is now investigating this phenomenon that has shaped her own social identity in order create an artistic impression of its impact on “those struggling to reintegrate into the Manchester community by allowing them to explore the surrounding issues of cultural and social identity”.
She hopes to collect as wide a response as possible and gather stories spanning gender, generation and community. Mahmoud’s own family are originally Pakistani and she acknowledges the large Mancunian-Pakistani community as something that made her path to reintegration easier. As part of her project she wants to explore how people returning to other communities found the same process; in particular she is interested in people that may not fit any community at all, already having interviewed a number of asylum seekers.
Mahmoud also hopes that it will help “those struggling to reintegrate into the Manchester community by allowing them to explore the surrounding issues of cultural and social identity.” It will be up to those who view the final exhibition to decide the answer to her question of whether “the subjects of the project still belong? Did they reintegrate?”
Edward Collins
If you want to contribute your experiences or if you wish to know more details contact Tania Mahmoud through t.mahmoud@hotmail.co.uk prior to the end of December. The final exhibition will be displayed early next year.
More: Culture, Exhibition
Comments
No comments found
The comments are closed.
