After having watched the two videos above, write a blog post where you summarize the content briefly. Then explore one of these issues – the most urgent and/or interesting one to you – and explain why you think so.
Ingunn
Here’s an extra video from the Economist if you are more into tech issues: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlQ_4604Xfg&t=3s
As Election Day in the USA is approaching, what does it matter to the rest of the world who becomes the next American president? Here’s a look at how global issues will be affected: https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/10/22/926692628/trump-and-biden-on-global-issues-from-reproductive-rights-to-refugees
Read this article:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-54476569
Also follow the link https://www.bbc.com/news/world-54477214 to learn more about the work of the UN World Food Programme.
Find out more about the Zero Hunger Goal here: https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/hunger/
Then write a blog post about the goal and what you think about the Nobel Committee’s decision to award this year’s Peace Prize to the World Food Programme. Give examples of the work they do. How is the goal of no hunger related to peace?
2. Work in pairs. One person reads up on migration, the other on refugees. Take turns telling each other what you found out:
https://www.un.org/en/sections/issues-depth/migration/index.html
https://www.un.org/en/sections/issues-depth/refugees/
You should also check out The International Organization on Migration:: https://www.iom.int/
3. Read the two texts below:
Discuss what they tell you about the issues of migration and refugees. What thoughts do these texts provoke in you?
Warshan Shire has said it is important to her to “tell the stories of those people, especially refugees and immigrants, that otherwise wouldn’t be told, or told inaccurately.” What do you think she means by this? Does she succeed in doing so with her poem? Give examples from the text. Can you find similar examples from the other text you read?
4. Immigrant Posters: Discuss these posters and the message they send:
5. The situation in Moria
Read this article to find out more about the situation in Moria after the fire: https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/09/12/greeces-moria-camp-fire-whats-next
Watch this video:
6. The artist Banksy has donated a lot of art and even a ship to the cause of helping refugees in the Mediterranean Sea.
What do you think about this kind of activism, combining art, creation of awareness and collecting money for a cause?
Discussion questions:
Watch this 15-minute video produced by the Guardian and read this article from the same news source detailing how some indigenous peoples experience changes to their culture due to effects of climate changes.
What challenges and benefits do the people on Greenland experience because of climate changes? And while Aboriginal Australians may have the same core problem, given their vastly different physiography the effects are even more devastating. Add governmental obstructions, for instance when it comes to infrastructure, into the equation, and it is hard to see any benefits from climate changes like the Greenlanders do. So what challenges do the people of Australia’s Northern Territory face because of climate changes?
Hilde
Sources:
Last week you worked to help enable youth in DR Congo choose education over working in mines. But did you know that that is only one issue the country is facing? Another is Ebola, and an epidemic has plagued the country since August 2018. Sadly, people working towards spreading information and trying to prevent the disease from spreading further are becoming targets… Read this short update from BBC for the current situation and yesterday’s violent attack on a journalist and his wife.
Did you know that Ebola is still not eradicated? Nor HIV, despite existing medicines? Nor measles? Nor a number of other diseases? Why, in today’s day and age? Two weeks ago, the New York Times published an article about the recent Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It has been five years since the world was scared almost into hysteria during the “last outbreak”, but was it really the last outbreak?
A week ago NRK published a series of pictures released by Doctors Without Borders, listing several forgotten humanitarian crises. I have not been able to find that topic mentioned in other media the last month.
And on a considerably different note, the Saudi Crown Prince was interviewed last night by the CBS show 60 Minutes. He was asked about wide-ranging topics, from the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi a year ago, to women’s rights, to the war in Yemen. Did you know there is a war in Yemen?
Tomorrow in class you are going to write for 90 minutes. The tasks will invite you to discuss media in terms of global crises. You might not use any of these topics in your discussion, and media’s focus on Greta Thunberg, or on the Notre Dame fire rather than the fires in Brazil’s rainforest, could be equally interesting starting points. But you do need a starting point, a point of reference, when discussing how media works, or for whom media works, or in which situations we rely on media, or however I plan on phrasing one or two tasks for you. Good luck, and do not hesitate contacting me if you have any questions for tomorrow!
Hilde
Sources:
Today we are going to follow the awards ceremony and listen to the Nobel lectures taking place in the City Hall in Oslo: NRK’s coverage of the awards ceremony
The Nobel Peace Prize 2018 was awarded jointly to Denis Mukwege and Nadia Murad “for their efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war and armed conflict.” We have earlier seen that Denis Mukwege has worked relentlessly for women who have been raped and sexually assaulted in conflicts in The Democratic Republic of Congo. Nadia Murad from Iraq was kept a sexual prisoners of the IS and continues to be one of the strongest spokespersons against sexualized violence. She belongs to the Yezidi minority, which you can read more about here. To learn more about her activism, read this article from the Guardian
The global sanitation crisis is reflected in the following facts, according to reports from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF):
http://www.un.org/en/events/toiletday/
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