By The Catalyst Editorial Board.
Catalyst contacted Olivia Bizot to discuss her upcoming article “The Victims, the Villains, the Voiceless: An Examination of the British Media’s shifting Representations of Refugees During the 2015 Refugee Crisis” in the Spring 2019 edition of Chrysalis. Her article discusses the ways in which British media portrayed refugees during the refugee crisis. If you are interested in her article, you can watch her thesis video, where she explains it in length.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80OfDWX_Etg&w=560&h=315]Originally from Oxwich, a village in South Wales, Olivia wanted to come study at McGill since it seemed like a new, exciting and stimulating experience. On campus, she has been involved with CKUT90.3, our student radio, McRun, and McGill Students for Oxfam Québec. In addition, she has had the opportunity to intern with Migrasia, TravelMall and Danone Communities. Her interest in academia lie in the relationship between media, journalism and democracy.
A few weeks before writing her article, Olivia stumbled upon Al Jazeera’s impressive interactive media project Life on Hold, that presents personal accounts of ten Syrian refugees living in Lebanon. Oliva was fascinated by this incredible initiative and wanted to learn more about refugee representations in the media. Her article was written in the aftermath of Brexit, where he national press was dominated by anger and frustration. She hoped to explore the power of media in influencing public opinion and its impact on the national discourse surrounding refugees.
Olivia loved writing her article and learned a lot from it, as such she really wanted to share this piece with her peers. She hopes it will incite readers to challenge traditional perspectives of refugees and to seek a more powerful truth by exploring new forms of media.
You can find Olivia’s article here.
