Monday, September 21, 2015
In the 1980s, Canada was the first country to accept large numbers of Baha’i refugees from Iran in the wake of the Islamic revolution. Although this refugee program successfully settled approximately 3,000 refugees, and later served as a model for a wider settlement of approximately 10,000 Baha’i refugees in 25 other countries, it did not receive widespread public attention at the time.
This symposium brought together researchers and key individuals involved in the Iranian Baha’i Refugee movement of the 1980s to develop an agenda for the study of this largely overlooked episode. Panel discussions situated this experience in the history of Canada’s refugee policy and in the field of migration and diaspora studies. They examined it as an innovative model of immigrant integration and dedicated work by officials in the context of internationalist ideals of Canadian public policy. They considered the diverse personal experiences of forced migration and identity negotiation in a diaspora community.
This gathering launched a two to three year collaborative public history research project supported by the Baha’i Community of Canada, the Carleton Department of History, the Carleton Centre for Public History, the Migration and Diaspora Studies Initiative at Carleton University and the Canadian Immigration Historical Society. The research project will be of interest to the public policy community and academics with interests in migration, immigration, refugees, policy development, the Baha’i Community, Iranian diaspora, cultural identity or refugee settlement.
Please visit http://www.symposium.bahai.ca for more information.
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