UW alumna screens documentary ‘In Search of Nabad’
UW alumna Sorayya Aminian was on campus on Monday afternoon for the screening of her documentary, “In Search of Nabad,” in the Allen Auditorium.
“My whole city is broken and everything is different. Have you ever seen a nuclear bomb on YouTube? That’s what it looks like. It’s absolute poverty,” said a Somali woman in the documentary.
The documentary shows Somali refugees living in Seattle, recounting their escape from their war-ridden country and their search for “Nabad,” which means “peace.”
“I realized how much I didn’t know about the people around me,” said co-director and co-producer Brian O’Rourke, who previously worked in West Seattle and is currently a postgraduate student in Documentary Practice at Queen Mary University in London. “I was working in one of the most diverse zip codes on the entire planet and realized how much we don’t know about our neighbors … [Making this film] allowed us to share what we learned and begin a conversation.”
The film addressed several issues facing Somali refugees in Seattle, including the cultural discourse between Somali parents and the children they raised in America, an inability to get jobs because of language barriers, discrimination faced because of cultural practices, and the separation of families as a result of immigration policies.
The filmmakers are hoping to raise awareness about the Somali community in Seattle by creating a film that shows challenges Somali immigrants are facing.
“It was apparent pretty quick that there was something really special about the (Somali) community,” said producer Nathan Sander, who now works in the public education arena in Seattle. “[The directors] were able to take that and turn it into a digestible format in this film.”
The filmmakers also said they wanted to show the human side, rather than the political side, of immigration that is often seen in the news.
The film featured a variety of people including young children, a college student who had raised $3,000 to build better water supply systems in Somalia, and a group of elders who had lost family members in the war. It also highlighted a group of students who worked on an art project called “Layers of the Hijab”; these students talked about discrimination they had faced because of their cultural practices.
Aminian, co-director and co-producer, said she was drawn to this topic because her father is an immigrant from Iran. She felt Somalia and Iran are often misrepresented in the same way and she wanted to bring attention to this issue.
The screening, which was organized and sponsored by the Department of History and the African Studies Program at the Jackson School of International Studies, was followed by a discussion with Aminian, O’Rourke, and Sander. They plan to further share their film with the community at upcoming film festivals.
Reach reporter Megan Herndon at news@dailyuw.com.Twitter: @megherndon