Training 20 Turkish and Refugee Journalists

In an effort to combat the spread of racist, xenophobic narratives against migrant communities through mainstream media in Turkey, HasNa partnered with Krkayak Kültür Sanat ve Doga Dernegi in Gaziantep, Turkey, and the Center for Global Peace Journalism at Park University, Missouri, to pilot a capacity building project titled Media in Tandem: Social Cohesion through Storytelling targeting young journalists from migrant and host communities in Gaziantep. The main objectives of this project are:

1. To promote social cohesion between migrant and host community journalists by encouraging them to collaborate and learn with one another
2. To enhance the professional capacities of journalists through targeted skills trainings thereby better preparing them for the labor force
3. To raise awareness of the issues of xenophobia and hate speech relating to refugees in Turkey, fostering empathy with forcibly displaced communities on an international scale

The first phase of the project comprised a series of 12 training sessions on various aspects of peace journalism. Cross-cultural collaboration is a core value upheld by HasNa, which is why the project was designed to facilitate collaboration not only among the Turkish and migrant journalists, but also among Turkish and American experts who came together to share knowledge and best practices on a variety of topics. The 12-week training curriculum included weekly sessions on various aspects of Media and Communications, including Peace Journalism, Human Rights and Media, Visual Media Ethics, Citizen Journalism, Communication Law, Gender Equality in the Media, and the Representation of Refugees in the Media.

In the second phase spanning 3 months, the project participants were divided into four multicultural groups. Each group received a small stipend to produce one audio-visual digital story on the overarching theme ‘immigrants’ which would then be made available in English, Turkish, and Arabic for international audiences. Since the participants were already professional or student journalists, no additional training was provided on videography or documentary film-making. The digital stories that emerged from this project serve as important testaments to the lives and struggles of immigrant communities living in Turkey.

The four digital stories that came out of the project may be viewed here: 

1. Chess

2. Music

3. In Between

4. Youth

Links:

• HasNa Media in Tandem Webpage