Gender Justice/Equality in Lebanon Workshop

هل القوانين في لبنان تحمي حقوق المرأة وتعزز المساواة الجنسانية Gender Equality؟ ماذا عن تطبيقات القوانين والمعايير الاجتماعية والعقلية السائدة الابوية؟ وقوانين الأحوال الشخصية؟ كيف يمكن تمكين المرأة في القطاع السياسي والاقتصادي؟ ما هي الخطوات العملية التي يمكن للمواطنين والمجتمعات والأحزاب السياسية اتخاذها لتحقيق المساواة في الحقوق والفرص والواجبات؟ كيف يمكننا تفكيك الصور النمطية القائمة […]

لا تفعلي هذا

لا تفعلي هذا فالرجال لا يحبون المرآة…القوية لا تفعلي هذا فالرجال لا يحبونا المرآة…الذكية لا تفعلي هذا فالرجال لا يحبون االمرآة…المتحررة لا تفعلي هذا فالرجال لا يحبون االمرآة…المفكرة لا تفعلي هذا فالرجال لا يحبونا المرآة…الرومانسية لا تفعلي هذا فالرجال لا يحبونا المرآة…الحالمة لا تفعلي هذا فالرجال لا يحبون االمرآة…المتكلمة. اذا سألت معظم الفتيات عن أكثر […]

More than Ebola or ISIS (Da3ech), the Past would become “the Lash with which Yesterday flogs Tomorrow”!

500 students’ narratives of war and visions of peace were collected during storytelling sessions and art workshops from 2007 till 2014 in my classrooms at Holy Spirit University (USEK), St Josef University and Notre Dame University in Lebanon. This qualitative research with young people born in the 1990s, from different religious/sectarian, political  and social-economic affiliations, […]

Why we must teach/learn Peace

The first step toward change is awareness. The second step is acceptance. (Nathaniel Branden) Following the analysis of several documents tackling the issue of war in the Middle East, a student of mine asked this morning: “How can there be Peace in this bloody chaotic no man’s land?”  This particular question settled in my mind […]

Perceptions du corps de la femme au Liban

Bien que les définitions de l’être femme soient diverses au Liban, il en est une qui constitue la norme et qui reste difficilement détrônable, quelles que soient les appartenances confessionnelles, politiques, socio-économiques et générationnelles : afin d’être acceptée par l’autre (individuel et collectif), de préserver son honneur et son intégrité (et l’honneur de la famille) et […]

Our history is not drawn linearly, it is a braid of stories!

I started to be interested in the war and peace issues in Lebanon when I left my home country to pursue my studies at the University of Montreal (QC, Canada). While living abroad, I learned that once the war grabs hold of you, it never loses its grip; it shapes one’s emotions, thoughts, attitudes and […]

Thank you for teaching us Life Lessons

On the 9th of March, Lebanon celebrated Teachersa�� Day. During my early years, every year, I used to get my mother a small gift on that day; we were taught in school that mothers are the greatest of all teachers. How do we feel about teachers nowadays? For some reason, university professors arena��t counted as […]

Je ne suis personne (Manne 7adan)

Je ne suis personne (Manne 7adan)… Je ne suis pas l’enfant d’un zaim, d’un chef de tribu, ni d’un politicien ou d’un homme religieux. Je ne suis pas une actrice ou une chanteuse, une romancière ou une femme de ‘haute société’. Je ne suis pas un homme d’affaires, un journaliste de renom ou un lauréat […]

We cannot give up!

In the last decades, religious fundamentalism was on the move in several countries, but so were mainstream interfaith dialogue, dynamic encounters among ethnic origins, sexual identities and social classes, and secular ideas/practices/movements. In counterpoint to tidal waves of authoritarianism, terrorism, extremism, exclusivism and absolutism, there were (and still are) individuals and groups of people breaking […]

Human Rights in Lebanon: There is a lot of work left to be done!

“The rights of every man are diminished when the rights of one man are threatened” (John F. Kennedy). When I first decided to write about human rights in Lebanon, I was not aware of how important this subject is and how much it affects our daily life. However, the more I read, the more it […]