Testimonies and their Surroundings (2022): Film Screening & Discussion with Rune Steenberg
This presentation is sponsored by SFU's David Lam Centre in collaboration with SFU International Studies and the UBC Xinjiang Documentation Project.
Join us for a screening of Testimonies and their Surroundings (2022), a 35-minute film presenting intimate first-hand accounts from former detainees of Xinjiang鈥檚 鈥渞e-education鈥� camps. Created in collaboration with the Racial Imaginary Institute, the film explores resilience and the human cost of systemic violence, structured into six segments: life before arrest, detention, camp conditions, forced 鈥渆ducation鈥�, violence, and impacts on the families of detainees. The event will include an interactive discussion with the filmmaker, Dr. Rune Steenberg, offering deeper insights into the film and its themes.
Speaker Bio
Dr. Rune Steenberg, an anthropologist and human geographer based in Kyrgyzstan, has conducted extensive fieldwork in Xinjiang, China, and Central Asia. His work focuses on Uyghur culture, mass incarceration, and regional transformations, earning recognition for its academic and humanistic contributions. Currently, Dr. Steenberg is the head of the EU-funded project Remote Ethnography of Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region at Palacky University Olomouc in Czechia dedicated to preserving testimonies and documenting the experiences of minority communities affected by mass detention and cultural suppression in Xinjiang.