Azra  Rashid Author of Evaluating Organization Development
FEATURED AUTHOR

Azra Rashid

Research Fellow
Department of Gender and Cultural Studies, University of Sydney

Azra Rashid is an instructor in the Humanities Department at John Abbott College in Montreal and Research Fellow in the Department of Gender and Cultural Studies at the University of Sydney. Azra’s research is focused on testimony and representations of gender in discourses of war.

Biography

Azra Rashid is an instructor in the Humanities department at John Abbott College in Montreal, and research fellow in the department of Gender and Cultural Studies at the University of Sydney. Azra’s research is focused on testimony and representations of gender in discourses of war. She has presented aspects of her research at international conferences and published in academic journals and anthologies on various issues concerning research methodology and representation of gender in the existing discourses of genocide. Her book, Gender and Genocide in Cambodia: Surviving Khmer Rouge (2023), explores the multiplicity of women’s experiences in the Cambodian genocide during the four-year rule of the Khmer Rouge. Her book, Gender, Nationalism and Genocide in Bangladesh: Naristhan/Ladyland (2018), investigates selective remembering of women’s experiences in the 1971 genocide in Bangladesh and offers a counter-narrative that emphasizes a gendered reading of that genocide. Azra also has over 15 years of experience as a filmmaker and story-teller. Her films have been screened at international film festivals and broadcast on national television in Canada.

Education

    Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Sydney, Australia
    Postdoctoral Fellow, McGill University, Canada, 2016-2018
    PhD, Concordia University, Canada, 2011-2016
    MJ, Ryerson University, Canada, 2009-2010
    Broadcast Journalism, Seneca@York, Canada, 2004-2005
    BA (Hon.), University of Toronto, Canada, 1999-2003

Areas of Research / Professional Expertise

    Gender; Genocide; Trauma; Memory; Testimony; Archive; Film; Research-Creation

Books

Featured Title
 Featured Title - Gender, Nationalism, and Genocide in Bangladesh - Rashid - 1st Edition book cover

Articles

Public, Volume 34, Issue 68, Dec 2023, p. 41 - 50

The Other World: Diasporas and Their Memories of War


Published: Feb 01, 2024 by Public, Volume 34, Issue 68, Dec 2023, p. 41 - 50
Authors: Azra Rashid
Subjects: Media and Cultural Studies, Asian Studies, Gender & Intersectionality Studies

This paper offers a brief meditation on representations and framing of the trauma of women survivors of war living in diaspora, and the utility of academic and creative methods, namely Research-Creation, that allow us a re-framing of the narrative by creating a space for feminist solidarity and remembering.

Liminality of Justice in Trauma and Trauma Literature

ON TRAUMA: WOMEN PERPETRATORS OF THE KHMER ROUGE


Published: Sep 09, 2023 by Liminality of Justice in Trauma and Trauma Literature
Authors: Azra Rashid

This paper looks at the turbulent history of Cambodia that led to the ascent of the Khmer Rouge to power and examines the Khmer Rouge perpetrators as historically wronged people. Focusing on the women perpetrators of the Khmer Rouge, this essay closely examines perpetrator trauma with the help of the testimony of Bet Bouen, a former member of the Khmer Rouge.

Feminist Media Studies

The Politics of Veiling and Unveiling: The Feminist Revolution of Iran


Published: Nov 12, 2022 by Feminist Media Studies
Authors: Azra Rashid

The murder of Mahsa Amini has galvanized a movement for women’s rights and freedom in Iran. Translating political movements and their slogans is often a daunting task, as identities, histories, and struggles are not easily translatable cross-culturally.This article argues that reframing the discourse to focus on the protest as being against state control, instead of hijab, will be a more useful way forward for feminist movement globally.

Canadian Journal of Communication, Volume 46(3), 2021.

Making Visible the Work of Translation in Transnational Feminist Research


Published: Aug 16, 2021 by Canadian Journal of Communication, Volume 46(3), 2021.
Authors: Azra Rashid

Transnational feminist work seeks to cross boundaries that are more than just state borders. This article explores some of the mechanisms and strategies that can be employed by researchers, their participants and collaborators working cross-culturally in order to bring visibility to gender(ed) representations and their mediation within and by a cross-cultural feminist research project.

The Conversation

Racism & the Americanization of Canadian history: Why we shouldn’t look at ourselves through a U.S. lens


Published: May 26, 2021 by The Conversation
Authors: Azra Rashid

The article looks at the Americanization of Canadian history

The Conversation

Canadian women who joined ISIS should be repatriated, investigated and rehabilitated


Published: Mar 31, 2021 by The Conversation
Authors: Azra Rashid

This article looks at gender-based discrimination in government's efforts to repatriate women who joined ISIS

Information, Communication & Society

Crossroads in new media, identity and law


Published: Nov 27, 2017 by Information, Communication & Society
Authors: Azra Rashid

Identity, as a process of articulation, forces not only creation and recognition of self but also of the ‘other’, both subject to their relative place in history.Since its inception mass media, with its one-to-many communication model, was to become an integral part of nationalist identity-building project. The advent of ICTs in the 21st century, with its many-to-many communication, the medium itself has been democratized.

II International Conference Gender and Communication: Conference Proceeding

Gender, nationalism and genocide


Published: Apr 01, 2014 by II International Conference Gender and Communication: Conference Proceeding
Authors: Azra Rashid

Currently, the feminist scholarship is divided on the relative importance of gender and ethnicity in the context of violence endured by women in genocide. Instead of treating “women” as a unified category and transcending history, space and boundaries, there is a need for detranscendentalization within the feminist discourse on representation of women’s experiences in genocide.

Canadian Journal of Communication

Gender and Genocide: A Research-Creation Project


Published: Jan 12, 2014 by Canadian Journal of Communication
Authors: Azra Rashid

Nationalism, rooted in the word nation, binds individuals to an imaginary home- land by virtue of shared characteristics, ethnicity, and landscape. Feminist scholarship has demonstrated that nationalism is gendered, crafted to serve masculine privilege. Genocide occurs when nationalism, itself a product of imagination, creates imaginary subjects, who fight over imaginary homelands, and the site of violence becomes women’s bodies.

Revue africaine de communication: Médias, conflits et droits humains

Reconstruction of Identity in Post-Genocide Rwanda


Published: Jan 01, 2014 by Revue africaine de communication: Médias, conflits et droits humains
Authors: Azra Rashid

Identity is positional and strategic; it is constructed, deconstructed and reconstructed depending on the conditions and scenarios facing an individual or group. This paper, through the use of a case study, argues that if identities are constructed in relation to the "other", then they can also be deconstructed as a result of crimes of mass atrocity such as genocide, and then reconstructed in a post-genocide scenario.

Videos

Gender and Genocide in Cambodia

Published: Dec 31, 2021

Using research-creation as methodology, this film investigates the multiplicity of the gendered experiences in the Cambodian genocide. This project examines the testimonies from women who experienced and survived the Pol Pot rule from various vantage points. This film pays close attention to the work of translation and interpretation that accompanies a transcultural research undertaking. This project is funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Naristhan:Ladyland

Published: Sep 16, 2016

As part of doctoral research, the film takes a critical look at the selective remembering of women’s experiences in the nationalist narratives of genocide. The essay film foregrounds the researcher/filmmaker’s subjectivity in talking about the 1971 war in Bangladesh and features stories of four women who experienced the 19771 war in Bangladesh.

A Woman's Place

Published: Oct 30, 2018

Food empowers individuals. “Food crisis,” heightened during times of war and genocide, is an inevitable result of colonization, militarization & corruption. In communities ravaged by death and destruction, women learn new skills to survive, including how to start and run their own businesses. Food for these women has become a statement of resistance as they turn the meaning of domestic space on its head and re-claim the space that was traditionally assigned to them without a choice.

A Woman's Story

Published: Dec 12, 2015

A Woman’s Story is a documentary film that challenges the silencing of women’s pain and trauma in the mainstream discourses on genocide and offers an intimate portrait of three survivors – from the Holocaust, the 1971 genocide in Bangladesh, and the Rwandan genocide of 1994 – through their stories of survival and resilience.

Dishonour Defied

Published: Dec 12, 2007

"Dishonour Defied" is a feature length documentary film on rape and status of women in Pakistan, focusing on the story of Mukhtar Mai who was gang raped in a remote village in Pakistan on the orders of a tribal council. Unlike many women before her Mukhtar Mai decided to confront her assailants. Dishonour Defied is the story of how Mukhtar Mai made a life with courage after the tragedy that befell her.

Unveiling the Abuse

Published: Dec 12, 2010

Unveiling the Abuse is a documentary about forced marriages in Canada and whether Canada's multicultural policies render women vulnerable to abuse at the hands of family in the name of culture and tradition. The documentary tells the story of Sandeep Chand, a Canadian woman of South Asian descent, who was forced into marriage twice by her family under the guise of the age-old tradition of "arranged marriage."