The Home and Displaced People
Migration: A Multidisciplinary Conversation
On 22 -23 September Home Renaissance Foundation, supported by the Social Trends Institute (STI), convened the Multidisciplinary Expert Meeting: The Home and Displaced People, hosted by the Catholic University of America in Washington DC.
The meeting organizer and leader Professor Sophia Aguirre and invited expert contributors discussed the global experience of migration, both that of people on the move and the governments and agencies engaged in addressing migration’s personal and geo-political impact. The lens through which contributors were invited to share their expert insight was that of the role of the home; the home as a place that is left behind; the sense of home that remains; the ways in which home can be reconstructed.
The dialogue that this approach afforded was rich and layered – as is the benefit of drawing in experts in different fields to focus on a shared concern. This model pioneered by STI and developed in fruitful partnership with HRF over recent years fostered both confidence and a collaborative attitude to the two days of the meeting. Perspectives were heard from the disciplines of psychology, media and communications, social entrepreneurship as well as those of the law, politics and public policy, and from leaders of agencies engaged in migrant programmes.
In the coming weeks HRF will be working on the next stage of this discussion and highlighting both the individual perspectives and the coming together of these strands to help see how the value of home – and of the people leaving and seeking home – can be incorporated into further research, policy and action.