Spring 2021 Student Participants
Dima Balut
Dima is a sophomore International Studies and History double major at Southern Methodist University. She is interested in human rights, particularly in the Middle East, because having lived in Lebanon for the majority of her life, she witnessed first-hand how damaging it could be for individuals to not have full rights under the law. This experience in large part is what shaped her passion for the law, and her hopes to attend law school after graduation.
The arts can help us better understand systems of oppression and their impacts, challenge white supremacy, foster dialogue around race and racism, and advance racial equity. The third in the R3 series,
“ARTivism: Using Arts-based Scholarship to Interrogate and Dismantle Racism,
” will highlight work by UNC scholars and current and former graduate students to do just that through a variety of artistic genres, including performance, storytelling, music, painting, and photography. We are also honored to include a spoken word performance by Chapel Hill’s inaugural Poet Laureate, CJ Suitt.
Moderator:
Travis Albritton, Clinical Associate Professor and Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, School of Social Work.
Non-Resident Scholar
Dima Toukan is the Founder and Managing Partner of Integrated International, a development consulting firm based in Jordan and leading assignments and programming in the MENA region. Previously, Toukan served as Political/Women’s Issues Specialist at the MEPI Regional Office in Abu Dhabi covering Jordan, Yemen, and the GCC. She also served as Head of Communication and Foreign Affairs at the Jordan Institute of Diplomacy and was a researcher at the Jordan Center for Strategic Studies at the University of Jordan.
Over the course of her career, Toukan has consulted for UNDP, USAID, IOM, AECID, OXFAM, the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, and CARE among others and has conducted several evaluations of international donor programming in Jordan and the region. Ms. Toukan has written for the Economist Intelligence Unit, Sada - Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, The Daily Star, and the Jordan Times. She has also co-authored the 2015 USAID Jordan National
Amal Kandeel
Amal A. Kandeel advises government, international, and private entities on economic and public policy; natural resources and sustainable development; and conflict/peace and human security issues. Her work has been focused on Middle East and North Africa (MENA) political economy and development, particularly on the nexus of freshwater resource security, climate change, food security, and sustainable agricultural/rural development, as well as women in development. She is also a writer on these issues for the Atlantic Council.
Ms. Kandeel was previously the director of MEI s Climate Change Program and a policy advisor to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization on MENA. She also advised Arab diplomatic missions and government agencies on natural resource and security issues. She worked at the Library of Congress as a subject matter expert. She also taught at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. Her work has been focused on Egypt, Jordan and Syria.