Having grown up in Lebanon (and now in London), with a personal history of exile, I believe the best learning, ideas and exchanges come together when there is a variety of different voices from multiple cultures. I often draw inspiration from, collaborate with and invite exchanges from different fields of cultural production and have a particular drive to bring the voices of those most underrepresented to the fore. For example, I am volunteer lead programmer of Otherfield film festival, an annual festival for filmmakers, that aims to stimulate and provoke new pathways and directions in creative nonfiction filmmaking and overcome the barriers that often exist between the professionals and those who often don’t have access to film schools or networks in the field. As programmer I have brought the work of female Arab filmmakers to audiences who would not usually have access to these voices.

I believe that there needs to be a stronger shaping of the media development policy agenda from the global south. I’m particularly interested in working with GFMD to foster more enabling and inclusive learning and collaborative environments that bring together the pockets of knowledge and experiences from across the world so that the advocacy agenda is truly bottom up and reflects the needs of all members, not just those most visible and vocal.