From the archives: Refugees & displaced people

At Lighthouse we livestream and record nearly all our events, one of the reasons being that we want the wisdom shared and questions asked to move beyond one moment and one room, to bring enjoyment and learning to folks where they are and where they are able to access it.

Welcome to the Lighthouse archive, a semi-regular blog series exploring past events, lists, articles and resources, using something that’s currently on our minds as a starting point - bringing beloved books and authors back into the spotlight.

15th - 21st June is Refugee Week. Established in the UK in 1998 around World Refugee Day on 20th June, it’s ‘the world’s largest arts and culture festival celebrating the contributions, creativity and resilience of refugees and people seeking sanctuary.’

Writing about Pride Month recently, Mairi noted how, even though Lighthouse is queer all year, June brings ‘a galvanising energy to a queer space like ours, and we’re going to need to bank those good vibes more than ever’. So with Refugee Week. Precisely because the plight of asylum seekers, the violence of borders and a cruel migration system are ever present, we need to harness all the attention and energy there is in the struggle for migrant justice - marking a week like this can be helpful for that, as long as it doesn’t excuse neglect the rest of the year.

This past week we’ve seen the far right gain ground on our streets, using death and tragedy as an excuse for untethered bigotry and leaving many communities feeling unsafe at home. We’ve also seen magnificent resistance.

Those efforts need buoyancy and the means to remain sustainable. They must also remain anchored in the needs of those most vulnerable to racist violence. Looking back through the Lighthouse web archive, we’ve assembled a list of recorded events and resources, highlighting both the reality of displaced people, and the work of those dedicated to saving lives in an inhumane system.

Firstly, have a look at this book list we put together for a previous Refugee Week.

Sally Hayden, the author of My Fourth Time, We Drowned, joined us for an online event back in 2022, to talk about the world’s deadliest migration route. You can watch the conversation here. We also compiled a book list of books available in the UK from Sally’s recommendations for Electric Lit here.

In an episode of our Read Think Act video series, Matthieu Aikins talks about his book The Naked Don’t Fear the Water, in which he follows his friend, Afghan translator Omar, trying to reach Europe. It’s, among many other things, a spotlight on the people who, again and again, provide dignity and safety to those seeking refuge, motivated by ‘an egalitarian politics that believed in a better world’. Here you’ll also find a wee list of resources and organisations.

Dina Nayeri, author of The Ungrateful Refugee and Who Gets Believed, was part of our 2024 Book fringe, talking about how we receive other people’s life stories based on the stories we carry within ourselves. You can watch the event here.

More recently, we hosted author and thinker Ece Temelkuran as she spoke to Nicola Sturgeon about reframing the very ideas of home, exile and belonging in her book Nation of Strangers. You can watch the event, from February 2026, here.