library of exile: future exiles - climate change and migration

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library of exile: future exiles – climate change and migration

This panel explores the interconnected nature of climate change and migration and accompanies the current Citi exhibition Arctic: climate and culture, and the library of exile at the British Museum.

Chaired by broadcaster, journalist and English PEN Trustee Georgina Godwin, the panel includes indigenous Arctic writer, spoken word poet and curator, Taqralik Partridge, Shaul Bassi, director of the International Center for the Humanities and Social Change at Ca’Foscari University of Venice, and James Thornton, an environmental lawyer and writer. The New Statesman named Thornton as one of 10 people who could change the world.

This is one of four thought-provoking events exploring the themes inspired by the library of exile, presented in collaboration with Edmund de Waal, English PEN, and the British Museum.

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About the speakers

Chaired by Georgina Godwin

Georgina Godwin is an independent broadcast journalist. A regular chair of literary events worldwide, she’s the voice of the Arts Podcast for The British Council. She is also Books Editor for Monocle 24 and presenter of the in-depth author interview show “Meet the Writers”. She is a frequent host of the award winning current affairs programme “The Globalist” and a commentator on Southern African politics. She was a founder member of SWRadio Africa, Zimbabwe’s first independent radio station (for which she was deemed “an enemy of the state” and banned from the country of her birth), and of the Harare International Festival of the Arts. She serves on the board of the charity, Developing Artists and is a fellow of the Gabriel Garcia Marquez Foundation. She tweets at @georginagodwin.

Taqralik Partridge

Taqralik Partridge is a writer, spoken word poet and curator originally from Kuujjuaq, NU now living in Kautokeino, Norway. Partridge's writing focuses on both life in the north and in southern urban centres, as well as the experiences of Inuit. She also incorporates throat singing into her live performances. Her performance work has been featured on CBC radio one and her writing has been reproduced in Swedish and French language translations. She has toured with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra under Kent Nagano and with Les productions Troublemakers under the direction of Cinematheque Quebecoise composer Gabriel Thibaudeau. Her short story Igloolik, published in Maisonneuve magazine, won first prize in the 2010 Quebec Writing Competition and has been published in Swedish and French.

Shaul Bassi

Shaul Bassi is associate professor of English literature. He graduated from Ca' Foscari University of Venice, studied at Berkeley and Liverpool, and earned his Ph.D. from the Universities of Pisa and Florence. His research, teaching and publications are divided between Shakespeare, postcolonial theory and literature (India and Africa) and Jewish studies. He has taught at Wake Forest University-Venice, Venice International University, Harvard-Ca'Foscari summer school and has been visiting professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz. He is the founder of the international literary festival Incroci di civiltà. He is the director of the International Center for the Humanities and Social Change at Ca'Foscari (hscif.org/venice).

James Thornton

James Thornton is the founding CEO of ClientEarth. The New Statesman has named him as one of 10 people who could change the world. The Lawyer has picked him as one of the top 100 lawyers in the UK. In 2016, he was named as one of the 1,000 most influential people in London. He has twice won Leader of the Year at the Business Green Awards. The Financial Times awarded him its Special Achievement accolade at the FT Innovative Lawyers Awards.