Stories from Rwanda: Agency, Editing and New Audiences

Rwandan government figures state that over a million people died during the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. The country's infrastructure was destroyed, family memory ruptured and Rwandan society left severely wounded. Survivor testimony and artistic explorations of the past play key roles in opening up new ways to remember genocide and explore post-conflict identities. However, in the aftermath of genocide, many stories were told by outsiders with little understanding of Rwanda's cultural and historical complexity.

Zoe Norridge's leadership fellowship Stories from Rwanda explored creative interdisciplinary approaches to foregrounding Rwandan voices in narratives about the genocide against the Tutsi. This grant supported, amongst other elements, the translation of Yolande Mukagasana's survivor testimony Not My Time to Die, writing and photography workshops with Rwandan artists, and a special issue of Wasafiri on Human Rights Cultures.

During this fellowship the PI and partners identified two unanticipated challenges:

1) A concern that foregrounding survivor voices fails to empower Rwandans if survivors are not also in positions to lead testimonial projects. Too often survivors feel their stories are instrumentalised and retold in manners that make them uncomfortable and may cause pain.

2) The realisation that there is a significant gap in UK resources for teaching the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. This is in part because, unlike the Holocaust, more recent genocides are not in the national curriculum. With the exception of Ishami Foundation materials, resources that do exist don't tend to involve survivors in their conceptualisation or delivery.

This follow-on-funding proposal responds to these challenges by drawing on AHRC-funded research insights into the value of interdisciplinary collaboration and arts-based approaches in foregrounding Rwandan voices.

Much of the work centres around 100 Stories, a collection of testimony from survivors, alongside stories from other Rwandans including rescuers, children of survivors and genocide perpetrators. Led by artist and genocide survivor Jo Ingabire Moys, these stories foreground significant moments from past and present, grounded in sensual and emotional detail, that offer wider insights on genocide. Showcasing survivor leadership, Norridge has supported this project since its inception and now seeks to assist Ingabire in collecting fifty new stories and moving onto a new project: editing and publishing the whole collection as a paperback book. This builds on her existing relationship with Rwanda's Huza Press who have agreed to publish the work. Together, the team will develop collaborative methodologies for editing the stories and build expertise amongst Rwandan publishing professionals in the areas of cover design and editing testimony.

The complete survivor-led collection of 100 Stories will offer a valuable resource for UK teachers. To facilitate their use in UK classrooms, the PI, postdoc and Ishami Foundation's CEO Eric Murangwa Eugene MBE (also a genocide survivor) will work alongside Genocide80Twenty at Hampton School, to map ways in which educators currently draw on Rwandan survivor testimony and develop resources to support teachers working with written and in-person testimony in the classroom. All the 100 Stories projects in the UK and Rwanda are supported by UK-based Rwandan survivor and mental health specialist Philomene Uwamaliya. She will also assist with the development of advisory guidelines for NGOs and genocide educators, in the UK and Rwanda, on collaborative working with survivors when producing materials featuring genocide testimony.

These active collaborations producing new materials for new audiences will support genocide education whilst also giving survivors more ownership over the ways in which their stories are used.