Forced migration is an international problem impacting global powers as well as smaller resource-constrained countries. The rhetoric, globally and locally is rife with a confusing tangle about war, violence, persecution, vulnerability, victimhood, thievery, welfare leaching, and economy recking. Arts Initiatives by Refugees for Refugees is a narrative-driven book based in global multi-site research about the arts and cultural dimension of refugee “crises” in discrete geographic and social-political contexts. The stories highlight agency, creativity, pleasure, celebration, entrepreneurship, friendship, and community because we typically don’t associate these things with refugees. They emphasize how refugees contribute to their own communities and their host countries, contrary to stereotypical and often xenophobic anti-refugee assumptions.
