A new website has been unveiled that documents personal stories from a refugee resettlement project in Italy, which is being evaluated by researchers of the Kellogg Institute's Ford Program in Human Development Studies and Solidarity.
Named "HumanLines," the website is a continually updated "web documentary" and portal of information created to support this academic work of Ilaria Schnyder von Wartensee and Clemens Sedmak, who are conducting a longitudinal research project aimed at monitoring and evaluating the various dynamics at work in the Humanitarian Corridors project.
The Humanitarian Corridors project is sponsored by the Italian Bishops’ Conference. It has brought 500 Eritrean, South Sudanese, and Somali refugees – most previously living in Ethiopian camps – to Italy, where they live in more than 45 Italian dioceses with Italian host families for at least one year. Schnyder von Wartensee and Sedmak, in partnership with Caritas Italy and the Community of Sant’Egidio, are assessing their integration into the country from the viewpoint of both the refugees and members of their Italian host communities by collecting their narratives over a five-year period, beginning in 2018.
With financial support from the Henry Luce Foundation and the Kellogg Institute, Schnyer von Wartensee has worked on the HumanLines site development with creative professionals in Italy to offer interactive content in both Italian and English, with an emphasis on photographs and videos to more vividly tell the stories.
"The goal of HumanLines is to narrate the stories and relate the dynamics, faces, beauty, and difficulties that make up and distinguish the Humanitarian Corridors project," explains Schnyder von Wartensee.
A video trailer offers an introduction to the HumanLines website and a HumanLines Facebook page is updated regularly to highlight stories from the site. Earlier coverage of the research project includes a Notre Dame feature story with an overview video that preceded the HumanLines website.