Social Work Spotlight - Episode 42: Shaun

Episode Date: October 29, 2021

In this episode, I speak with Shaun, a psychotherapist, community development practitioner and mental health researcher with experience in complex emergency settings. His work over the last 20 years has spanned across the United Nations, Government, University, NGO sectors and he is currently a Team Leader at the NSW Service for the Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture and Trauma Survivors in Sydney, Australia. Prior to working with STARTTS, Shaun served internationally with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in conflict and post-conflict areas. Shaun holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology, a Master's in Social Work and has further Postgraduate degrees in Peace Studies and Development Studies.Links to resources mentioned in this week’s episode:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1otqhAWaf2h0ZNwsb4US-u7PRPNiUs7abOXkbrH3j_0k/edit?usp=sharingThis episode's transcript can be viewed here:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vtGbWevG5bMdH_NWEcm6vYA6RsnEoqI9Y2ylxKltt2w/edit?usp=sharingThanks to Kevin Macleod of incompetech.com for our theme music.

Hi and welcome to Social Work Spotlight where I showcase different areas of the profession each episode. I'm your host, Yasmin McKee Wright, and today's guest is Sean Nemorin. Sean is a psychotherapist, community development practitioner and mental health researcher, with experiencing complex emergency settings. His work over the last 20 years has spanned across the United Nations, government, university, NGO sectors, and he is currently a team leader at the New South Wales Service, for the treatment and rehabilitation of torture and trauma survivors in Sydney, Australia. Prior to working with starts, Sean served internationally with the United Nations High Commissioner

for refugees in conflict and post-conflict areas. Sean holds a bachelor's degree in psychology, a master's in social work, and has further postgraduate degrees in peace studies and development studies. Thanks so much, Sean, for coming on to the podcast. Really excited to have a chat with you about your experience. experience in social work so far. Very nice to be here and thank you for the invitation. Absolute pleasure.

I'll start with asking when you started as a social worker and what drew you to the profession. I'm not sure I can say that I ever chose to be a social worker. Perhaps you could say that decision to study social work was perhaps linked to my life experience. I'd amassed over a number of years, my professional experience and also my academic interest and passion towards working with specific communities and also importantly a framework towards healing. I guess a lot of the things made sense to me that were integral to the professional social work, the bi-sico-social model, and also particularly the focus on human rights. Interestingly, however, I probably attribute my interest in social work or movement into that space

from, you know, my parents and, you know, my background growing up in Australia. My parents are from the island of Mauritius and from a young age became interested in conversations around racism, poverty and equity. And I was also forced to grapple with my own sense of identity as a migrant in Australia, you know, a sense of place and belonging. And I guess it was largely because of these questions, maybe preoccupations you could call them that I was drawn into, you know, that field and, you know, trying to support others along that process, you know, the same things that I experienced. I think I should also say that I

similarly attribute my involvement in football, in soccer growing up as having contributed, you know, a large way to the way I view particularly community development, also the way that I viewed social work in the context of communities healing from trauma maybe. Obviously, I played the sport, but also importantly, since the young age, I would accompany my father, who was a referee. And in the 1980s, a large proportion of the teams involved in the football leagues at the time were established around community and ethnic lines. And I guess over the course of some years, I came to observe how communities found safety in these activities, how many whom came from experiences of war and often from non-Engly speaking backgrounds invested time, they invested purpose into these establishments,

these teams. I came to view it as it was fundamentally around healing and, you know, Judith Herman persists a wonderful framework which helps understand trauma and, you know, she acknowledges that trauma doesn't just impact on the self, but also in relations to trust between others and similarly other theorists such as, you know, Jesuit priest and psychologist Ignacio Martin Burrow similarly put forward the idea around systemic state-sponsored terrorism. So, you know, previously in the 60s and the 70s and the 80s, there were these communities who had arrived after the Second World War and later, you know, from the Balkans, from South America and Africa, and, you know, they could all attribute to such circumstances, you know, the pervasive concepts of,

you know, oppressive regimes, oppressive governments on purpose would foster a sense of mistrust amongst the citizens as a way to establish control. So you had these traumatized and mistrustful communities who embarked on journeys to Australia. And I guess from a young age, I saw how it was, you know, how the involvement in football helped provide, you know, a safe environment for common purpose and endeavor through volunteerism within the community, you know, things to like to eat their own food, to speak their own language, and to enjoy a collective endeavor in which they all love.

And I guess that was something that made sense to them in a new land. and it was something that made sense to my family in a new land, you know, my father and finding that sense of purpose and safety and something that, you know, he understood and I was also involved in that. And for many, like ourselves, it became an integral part of this settlement journey, the necessity to first find a sense of safety and place within your own community. So reforging those ties that have been severed because of war. and, you know, this is before being able to properly associate with other communities and, obviously, to mainstream Australia.

So, you know, these things that I was observing, I gained an intrinsic understanding of ideas that, you know, social work theorists would describe, obviously, as social capital, you know. So, firstly, the bonding social capital, so the reforging of ties severed by war and systemic state-sponsored terrorism. and then onto, you know, bridging social capital. So bridging those divides with other similar communities and also to, you know, mainstream society. So it was, you know, effectively meeting on an equal playing field metaphorically and conceptually and forming those bonds of trust. Yeah, so, yeah, I guess those were the key drivers for me.

Obviously, you know, my experiences of racism growing up and sometimes feelings of not fitting in and a desire to support others along that process and to help seek their own sense of belonging. And you didn't originally think that you were going to set out to study social work. He studied psychology originally. Yeah. So I guess what's interesting in growing up, and I think that many can attest similarly, is that, you know,

there wasn't a proper understanding of what professional social work is. the understanding wasn't pervasive. There were no understandings of the frameworks. And so whilst the example of what I described earlier was very known to me, the idea of social work wasn't socialized, you know, within, at least in terms of at school and whatnot, you know, you had, of course, the occasional example of a social worker on TV or perhaps, you know, someone in the community. Yet there wasn't a clear understanding in terms of what they did or the broadness or, the broadness

or diversity of the role. And in many ways, I still think that that's an issue today. Many of us struggle in communicating what professional social work is. So I guess without that knowledge, I went into studies, you know, wanting to work therapeutically with individuals and communities. I had an interest in helping people heal from the wounds of war, from racism, from displacement, persecution. And I had that design without the knowledge of a better option at age 17,

You know, when you finish high school, I went on to study psychology. Yeah. I'm just thinking I've got this picture in my head of an elevator pitch, right? So someone's, you've got to explain what you do in a certain amount of time. And I can imagine it's difficult to champion the profession if they've already left the lift, right? Yes, yes. So sometimes it's so caught up in context. And sometimes you kind of have to say, I'm a social worker who does this versus I'm just a social worker

But because, as you've rightly said, so much of the time, the intricacies and the thought behind it, the approaches are so foreign to people. So it sounds as though you found social work through your psychology teachings, which already you had this idea of wanting to make a difference and providing community development opportunities and assisting people who were in similar situations to you or whatever. you'd experienced growing up. And social work was kind of a good vehicle to make that change. Absolutely. All it was the experience amassed after or directly after that, that had a framework that was probably outside of classic psychology, right, but yet resonated so deeply with me, particularly concepts around community development, around advocacy of human rights,

things like that, that, you know, fit very within a social. social work model and framework. Yeah. What's then led to this point in your career? You've done quite a lot since leaving uni. Yeah, so I guess maybe I could talk a little bit about from the beginning. You know, as I said previously, you know, my parents are from Mauritius and we grew up in an environment where Catholicism was deeply enmesh within the cultural framework of the island and of course amongst the dyspora. And importantly, there's also a focus on social justice. There was an interest in anti-racism around poverty, you know, around equity and

a sense of fairness, I suppose. So as a teenager, I volunteered as a youth leader and as a mentor and with some of the young people whom I worked with around that time. So this would have been in the mid-90s. So I was mentoring some young people from the Balkans who had been recently resettled to Australia and others from South America as well. Yeah, so from that, you know, of course, I mentioned that I went on to study psychology, and then directly after graduating, I went into further postgraduate studies in peace and conflict studies. Yeah, so these were postgraduate studies and also in immigration law and practice. So this would have been directly after the Tampa incident in 2001 and in the lead-up and in the

aftermath of the Iraq War that it was in 2003. So I was working with people with a refugee experience and with asylum seekers in immigration detention at that time. And then around 2005, I ended up leaving Australia. I soon work with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, so UNHCR. And at the time, there was a program called the AAD program, so the Australian Youth Ambassadors for Development. And this was a... was an Australian government initiative through OzAid. And each year, it'd seconded a number of younger professional Australians to work in international development. And I was given a position to work for UNHCR in Beijing, China. So in China, I was overseeing the community services

and mental health and psychosocial support portfolio for refugees and asylum seekers in the People's Republic and this office also covered Mongolia and Hong Kong. I ended up doing that for about four years and later I did a similar role in Nepal after the Civil War there. Later I was posted for another three years in Bangladesh so working with the Rohingya community in Cox Bazaar and similarly in cross-border missions into Myanmar a place called Mungdo where a lot of the Rohingya live So this was just up until the intercommunal fighting in 2012. And then after that, I served in the war in Northern Mali operation on the border with Burkina Faso and later in the Great Lakes, so in Burundi and with Congolese refugees from eastern DRC.

So a lot of my roles were predominantly around mental health and psychosocial support, managing community services initiatives for refugees in camps. in complex emergencies and also in child protection as well. And then I ended up resigning from my role in UNHCR after my father was diagnosed and later passed away with cancer. And I ended up returning to Australia around 2014. Since then, I've been working with Starts. So the New South Wales Service for the treatment and rehabilitation of torture and trauma survivors. I can imagine your background with soccer would have helped you in those. various communities, very diverse, cultural and linguistic communities where that was kind of probably

the common language? Yes, absolutely in many ways. I mean, hey, in some context, I did speak a local language. I mean, I did end up picking up Mandarin Chinese and I speak French. So this was commonly used in the environments that I was working with, particularly in Burundi and Congo and Mali, Libra Kina Faso and other French-speaking countries in Central and West Africa. But yeah, football absolutely was a common language and has always been since growing up. And I've often talked about sport in the context of healing, but also as a common language as well. And I often tell practitioners who engage in this space, particularly in working with young people, you know, it's pretty much community services 101, you know, at least having

something of an understanding of football is something of a great engagement tool and a way to build rapport, particularly with young people. Yeah. Yeah. And you've also had an opportunity to do some work with remote communities in Northern Territory. Yes. So I work for about five months with territory families, so in Wormunguland, in Tenet Creek and in the Barclay region of the Northern Territories.

So places like, you know, Ambludovich, Alpuluram, you know, Alikarang, Taarang, all those places there. So I love that time. I learned so much about myself in that time, I suppose, and, you know, feeling a sense of welcome amongst working with Aboriginal communities. Yeah, I would encourage any practitioner who has the opportunity to do such, in terms of a place for learning. It was exceptional.

And so that kind of gave you a really good basis, a good grounding for the work that you're doing now with people who have faced displacement and supporting their community development, I imagine. What might a typical day look like for you, where you are now? Yeah, so at least for the last five years, I've been the manager for the school liaison program, it starts. And I guess my day really varies, as the program is very multifaceted. The school liaison program works across New South Wales and it was funded as a result of the increased humanitarian intake from Syria and Iraq in 2016. So its predominant aim is to improve psychosocial outcomes for young people with a refugee experience across schools. And we work with government schools. We work

with Catholic schools and independent schools as well. Our focus is both strategic and responsive. So strategic in that it aims to partner with key school stakeholders to look at systems and see how we can action plan ways to move barriers for young people, receiving the curriculum, tackle issues such as racism, providing professional learning support to teachers, counselors in understanding the refugee experience, recognizing trauma in the classroom and, of course, ways to support, also support in building capacity. around skills pertaining to things like incidental counseling, and also importantly, which is a growing issue around, you know, mitigating the impact of vicarious traumatization.

Starts in schools in general, we provide consultation and support to over 200 schools across New South Wales, and we're similarly responsive to the needs of schools and learners. of course in terms of an individual and group capacity. So we receive referrals for therapeutic group work and also for individual counselling as well. Whilst this is mostly done by the start's child and adolescent counsellors and youth workers, my team are mostly all therapists as well and we take on a limited caseload of young people, you know, for trauma counselling.

And yeah, so I guess that's how my day looks like, you know, It's quite varied. So obviously there is the program management aspect, including supervision and team oversight. However, I also maintain my own caseload of counseling clients whom I see weekly. Similarly, I might conduct a professional learning workshop in a school, providing consultation about a contextual issue which, you know, might have arisen, which is pertinent to young people with the refugee experience. There's also the chairing of stakeholder network.

relevant to refugee education, so involving key stakeholders from, say, the Department of Education, Catholic Schools, New South Wales Health, Multicultural New South Wales, Department of the Premier Cabinet and others. So it's very varied. You know, of course, several nights a week as well. I provide counselling services to detainees in Villalwood Detention Centre. This is also done through starts. And, you know, it's really contextual. So, you know, this last week, my team has been supporting schools who have enrolment of Afghan students impacted by the events overseas. We've been liaising with school executive around ways to support their students better and come up with, I suppose, ideas in how we can do this remotely, given the current COVID situation.

So it's really quite varied and based on, you know, the immediacy of the issues at the moment. Also, I sit on several boards. So this is something which is really important to me. And I acknowledge that this work is a global movement. The right to the rehabilitation of torture and trauma is a global exercise. And the experiences of people here are obviously linked to those overseas. So in the past, I've supported entities such as the IRCT, which is the International Council for Victims of Torture.

And I'm on the board of Isra. and this is a similar entity that we hold conferences around best practice in the torture and trauma space. So, you know, being involved at that global level, you know, it's really interesting to see how, you know, social workers have impacted the field globally. You know, of course, in Australia too. And the first executive director of starts was a social worker. And, you know, you've had so many pioneer therapists, you know, who are social workers in this field people like, you know, Robin Bowles. and my own boss and mentor, Yasmina Bajrakhtaravich. So yeah, there are many, many issues, I suppose. And, you know, there are different causes which remain so dear to my heart, which involved in, you know, in addition to the work that I'm doing.

I mentioned before that I've worked a lot with the Rohingya community. And, you know, my heart is so dearly in mesh with their plight, I suppose. And I consult on various research projects around well-being. trauma, you know, and this is ongoing, and of course I also provide financially or consult to several community-based initiatives in Bangladesh and elsewhere. Just lastly, I think it's important to talk about this because it's linked to the role and also around how I view social work in general, but the research projects that I've been involved with have sort of highlighted the need for social work. And I think the fact that at our very core, we are disruptors, you know, we are agitators

and we are advocates. And it sets us apart from other professions. And, you know, I want to highlight, you know, some of the work done with the Rohingya, particularly in the light of a research project that, you know, if people look online, they can find some papers and some different podcasts that myself, Dr. Ruth Wells and Dr. Simon Rosenbaum from the University of New South Wales, collaborated with. And we've looked at how communities themselves conceptualized trauma. And we've found a number of of cultural idioms of distress, but essentially, you know, the key determinant to the distress of the Rohingya community was specifically around the lack of rights, so being stateless, yeah?

So without that, you know, without rights, being stateless, there is no well-being. So as a practitioner, you know, you can't address the psychological needs of the client without addressing the lack of rights, without seeing the individual within a complex interaction of environmental and ecological stresses. And I think, you know, these are things which are integral in our profession and training. And, you know, you were referencing that before also around working with Aboriginal clients. And this is something that I also saw that was so highlighted, particularly in terms of people's well-being there, which was, you know, so I see.

similar, common experiences in terms of those in which are experienced by refugees and people impacted by systemic state-stonsored terrorism, as similar as those experienced in many parts of Australia, particularly in the Barclay region that I worked in previously. I'm curious as to the makeup of the rest of the staff that starts. Obviously, you said it was started by a social worker, you're a social worker, but with a therapeutic background. What is the value add for you from your perspective of being a social worker? What other professions do you work with?

And what do you think your skills and knowledge and approaches add to the work that you do? Yeah, so it's quite varied in terms of the staff makeup. It's multidisciplinary. And I think that adds so much to the success and the approaches of start. So within my team alone, We have, you know, psychologists, we have social worker, we have an occupational therapist, we have a community development specialist, and within the agency in general, we have, you know, mostly psychologists, we have physiotherapists who do body focus work.

We have quite a few social workers as well. We have people who, you know, focus on communications, and we have specialist youth workers as well. So I think that, you know, everyone, contributes in certain ways, but as I mentioned before, I feel that our profession sits us in a really powerful way to engage with our clients, particularly because of that focus on human rights, right, and our advocacy focus, right? Because as I mentioned before, if we do not address those issues, right, if there isn't a focus that's placed on the break, down of oppressive systems that limit someone's access to rights, right?

Well, there's no well-being, right? And we are well-placed to be able to work within systems, work within different ecological spaces that limit people, and to be able to implement interventions that can specifically target such. Yeah. I'm aware there's also quite a lot more funding. for social work in schools and providing support to students. I did interview episode 10 with Scott, who was, yeah, so he started the social work in schools program with UNE. And I also spoke recently

with Lauren for episode 38, who's a school counselor, but also a social worker. How do you work then in collaboration with the social work in schools program and the school counselors? Yeah, so my program, we work, of course, across different government entities and also in school. So it's always done in partnership and building upon the capacity within the school, right? So it's not imposing anything because, you know, as you well know, schools aren't the easiest places for, I guess, in gaining access as external entities, right? So, you know, you need to show that what you're providing to young people is, you know, is evidence-based and is beneficial. So in many ways I feel that starts being quite successful in being able to show the efficacy of our work, right? So sometimes, you know, our interventions is done in partnership, right?

So, for example, there have been times whereby we have a school counsellor who might reach out to us and say, you know, listen, I've been a psychologist first. for many years or I've been a clinical social worker for many years. However, I lack experience in working specifically with young people with a refugee experience, right? It would be possible if we can co-deliver a group. So our focus is on capacity building, right? So once we can support that, then we can step away and then, you know, the practitioner there who's embedded within the school infrastructure would be able to then support more students and we wouldn't have to do it anymore. So that's one of the key tools in which we've used. And often we see, you know, at least in the schools that we've worked in, you know,

there have been either people from the social working schools project from UNE or new roles such as, you know, school support officers. You know, so, you know, they're investing a lot of money in terms of well-being. And sometimes the school support officers, you know, whilst they're often very educated, but sometimes they might not have that specialist experience in working. specifically with young people with a refugee experience. And as I said before, one of our main goals is to work alongside such individuals so that afterwards they might gain more experience in working with culturing

and linguists and diverse students and refugees, and then we'll be able to do that by themselves afterwards. Yeah. So that's one of the models you could say that we've taken in the past. But they're doing great work and we really appreciate that. I mean, there's a lot of work to go around. You know, yeah. You've mentioned part of your strategic approach is support for external providers in addressing or becoming aware of vicarious trauma.

How do you yourself manage within that space? What support do you need to do your role? Yeah, so, you know, this has been saying that has been, I guess, you know, really important to me. And, you know, one of the things that I acknowledge was that. that, you know, 20 years ago when I first started studying, whilst, you know, there was research around vicarious traumatization, it wasn't that pervasive in terms of, you know, at least within the curriculum, within the study that we were doing, right? So, you know, without that, you know, I went into the field and because I was mostly working in conflict zones and with

people who'd experienced trauma in immigration detention in Australia. And I should, you know, say that when I came back to Australia, around 2014, I had a PTSD experience. And this was largely as a result of vicarious and, but also individual trauma experience in complex emergencies and those crises that I described previously, right? But I guess the way that I've come to conceptualize that, there were two drivers. Of course, there was the trauma, right? There was the hypervigilance and the experiences of PTSD than many people have experienced, right?

But there was also the growth, right? There was also a great deal of growth in such context, right? And one of the things that often talk about, and some of it was influenced by, you know, a lot of growing, I guess, thought and a lot of growing scholarship that is in this. I was deeply impacted by the concept of tribe, right, and how we've evolved as humans. And I was deeply impacted by a book called Tribe. This was by Sebastian Junger, right? And he talks about the experience of being embedded in platoon during the Afghan war with American Marines, right?

And he speaks about an environment whereby the feeling of being, connected to your fellow platoon members, right, in a way in which they are reliant on one another, right, for their collective survival and well-being, and how that becomes such a potent, protective factor against the trauma that they're experiencing and witnessing on a day-to-day basis, right? And then juxtaposed against that, where, they're removed from that environment and they go back home, right, and people don't understand their experience and the sense of disconnection in an environment where no one can understand that where you can't speak to people and for them just to get it, right, where it's redundant

in terms of being reliant on someone else for your collective survival, right? And then the sense of disconnection, and this is something that I experienced, right, coming back and no one understanding the experience of the stories you were hearing, things that people were witnessing, but also the environment of having a group, right, of kindred spirits. And that is the thing that, you know, whilst there were so many challenges in the field, you became so close to your colleagues in this context, right? not just your colleagues, but also the people that you, you know, often the people that you're working with as well, but the experience was mostly around colleagues. And the feeling that you're reliant on your neighbor for your,

the collective survival of the group, right? Yeah. It was such a wonderful feeling. And it's something that I so deeply miss in many, many ways, right? Feeling connected. And, like, because, you know, in those contexts, you know, you've got boundaries that, just go out the door, right, in that people meet in such a human way. And of course, there is

the prospect of quite maladaptive coping mechanisms in things like that, such as, you know, excessive drug use and, you know, sexual promiscuity and things like that that, you know, we know in our experience of PTSD, but that feeling of when people are so deeply connected based on a common purpose and goal, right? In many ways, I feel this is fundamental to, our human evolution, right? That's how we've evolved as human beings. And then coming back and that sort of feeling is then redundant. So I've viewed the experience as being traumatizing, but also that great sense of growth, that great sense of connection, right? And I deliver a lot of workshops around vicarious trauma. And I talk about self-care and about professional boundaries. And

And these are really, really important and messages around seeds, right? But I think fundamental to our well-being as practitioners in this space, I feel that it's also about a connection to, you know, feeling of support, right, from within organizations and between colleagues as well, right? I think that that has a really, really important part to play. how it's impacted by, you know, sometimes neoliberal views of service provision and, you know, KPI and, you know, the corporatization of the work that we do. I think that that has a severe impact in terms of well-being.

And I think that, you know, it's a detriment towards, and, you know, it's a compounding factor of VT and things like that. But I think that what we need to do, right, is to place a focus on mutual support amongst one another and then a supportive environment in the workplace and a great deal of investment which is placed on that. And I suppose on an individual level, right, is the message of seeds, right? It was John Arden who came up with this. And it's a very simple message and I tell it to all my clients, right? And this is just to keep it together, right? So seeds, so S is similar to what I described previously, so around the establishing and maintaining positive social interactions, right?

And then you have E, which is around educating the mind. And it's not just about doing a formal course, but it's investing in things which interest you, right? And then there's the physical exercise. And then, you know, having a, you know, a positive and, balanced diet, and then investing in sleep and of course in sleep hygiene. And this is the message of seeds, and this is something that I try to do on a day-to-day basis. It's not always easy, but we definitely do our best in that regards. Yeah. What do you find most challenging? Obviously,

there are a lot of challenges, but you're going to face them from a different perspective. What sort of thing keeps you up at night? Yeah. There are a lot of positive things, as I mentioned before around a sense of purpose and the diversity of the role. And I suppose seeing people thrive and achieve and I love that. But I think for me the challenges, a lot of it, I think it's linked to the nature of the political climate within this space. You know, so the othering and the working with people, you know, who some are essentially the collateral damage in a policy of deterrence from our government.

And I think arguably, you know, it frustrates me that those that often make the decisions who have such immense power over people who have, you know, sought asylum sometimes and often have zero clue as to what their experience in terms of where they came from or sometimes care little for their stories. And then this is obviously juxtaposed against the often general support we provide to individuals who come by regular means, you know. yet unfortunately the years that I spend in environments, you know, where you often find, you know, the most needy, there's just no opportunity. There are little prospects. There's no opportunity in terms of formal mechanisms in which they can seek a sustainable protection space, you know. And I guess admittedly, had I been in the same scenario as those who chose irregular pathways, you know, I probably would have done the same, you know, if I desired a few. future, you know, I find it frustrating. And I guess, you know, often those at the decision-making level sometimes have no clue about the main drivers impacting human movements around the world,

and they're often unwilling to contribute meaningfully or, you know, with a sense of compassion and justice. And, you know, maybe this is supported in the electorate. I'm not sure, you know, but at least I know that myself and many other people are vehemently opposed to this. And, you know, what's crazy, the huge irony as well, you know, especially given the current COVID crisis is, you know, we're bombarded by messages from the authorities around being guided by health advice, you know, to protect us, you know. And yet, when it comes to the plethora of health professionals, you know, experts speaking about the impact of government policies on asylum seekers, you know, the copious amounts of research and input, which shows how our government's policies in relations to offshore and onshore detention on both refugee

and asylum seekers, you know, it's extremely detrimental to both the physical and mental health well-being of those individuals. Well, you know, I mean, that, those messages hasn't shifted in terms of the approach one ounce in terms of policy implementations. What have you seen change in terms of refugee focus or priority areas or maybe policy development or responsiveness of government or otherwise or any changes that result from electoral handovers? Has there been change for the better within the time you've been working in that area? I think there's been the cumulative change for the worse in many ways. Yeah. And this is despite there being a great deal.

of advocacy, you know, brilliant people who advocate vehemently, you know, medical practitioners, you know, social workers, researchers, right, lawyers, yeah, the best of the best, right, are engaging in this space and still I've seen a deterioration in terms of, yeah, protection space for asylum seekers in Australia. And in many ways, you know, I do agree that. Australia is exceptionally generous in terms of the support that we provide to people, you know, from the global humanitarian program. So individuals who have been resettled from overseas, right? But, you know, I also acknowledge that there's not a clear pathway. If there was, people would have done that a long time ago, right? And I generally believe that it's a huge stain on all of us as Australians,

whereby effectively we've resorted to torturing individuals, right? And I don't say that lightly, in order to create an environment of deterrence so other individuals don't arrive, right? And that is effectively using people as collateral damage in that space. And, you know, some of my clients had spent many years on Nauru and elsewhere. and often the work that we've done. And I acknowledge the extreme bravery of these individuals, right, who invested so much time in trying to overcome that suffering.

But the things that they're preoccupied in terms of their trauma wasn't, or to a lesser extent, was their pre-departure trauma, which led to them leaving in the first place, right? But it was actually their experience in detention, right? So what does that say? about us. Yeah, that's horrendous. Yeah, it is. I can imagine it must be even more frustrating for you having studied immigration law because so many other people would say, well, I don't understand that. I don't 100% get why these decisions are being made. I have to assume that there's a good

reason for it. But you've studied it. You understand it. You can see how things could be done differently. But at the same time, you probably feel quite powerless to push against it, especially if your funding is coming from some of these government departments. Yeah, absolutely. And I suppose, you know, as a practitioner, I acknowledge that, you know, there's a huge power dynamics as a worker and those that you work with. Right. And this was very, very apparent when I was working in the United Nations system and then

coming back to Australia. And I suppose my career in many ways has been something of an inverse. right, whereby there was a great deal of, I guess, power, I suppose, in terms of the work previously with the UN and managing large-scale programs, you know, and influencing, you know, or being involved, you know, with the lives of sometimes hundreds of thousands of people. And I suppose what I've come to realize is that systems can be built and can be destroyed in a heartbeat. If the recent events in Afghanistan can say anything that, you know, you can seem to invest 20 years in something and then you can, you know, in the blink of an eye, just all come crashing down, right?

So one of the things that I've tried to focus on or has become my main focus has been individuals, right? So investing in relationships with individuals and that is the thing that people always remember you by. So overseas, I tried to invest in people, right? And that's what they remember you from. And then I've tried for it to be the same thing here. And, you know, placing a lot less of a focus in terms of the broader context, right, but more at the grassroots and working with individuals and trying to work alongside and to come to work towards the best solutions for their lives that they can.

Yeah. You hinted at some of the projects or programs that you're working on in terms of research and you've also got a podcast and a blog. Can you tell me a little bit more about the things that you're doing on the side that are really interesting? Yeah, so we continue at UNSW with the Rohingya community and one of the other elements of that has been a project around supporting Bangladeshi psychologists and social workers as a clinical consultant. So providing clinical supervision who are working in Coxbizar, so working with the Rohingya community there.

And this is also a project that this team is also supporting a group of Syrian psychologists in Turkey as well. So providing clinical supervision with a team of, you know, myself and other clinical psychologists who are supporting locally based practitioners to provide clinical interventions. to provide clinical interventions for refugees in context in mass displacement. So that's one interesting project that I'm working with at the moment, in addition to the ongoing work around community-based and established interventions, complex of mass displacement. So maybe I can put some of those in the show notes if you're interested,

some of the research articles that we've published on that. In addition, my team, we run a website called Hints for Healing. and this website is around supporting practitioners, teachers, social workers, psychologists, youth workers, other people who are working alongside young people with a refugee experience in schools. Yeah, so providing tips, tools, research articles, videos, and we also run a podcast around that. So we get different practitioners from around the world and sort of talking about the different approaches that they're using. Yeah, so it's quite varied. And I can also put a link in the show notes as well if you're interested.

Perfect. Thank you. If you weren't doing this kind of work, obviously, this is your passion, this is your focus, and anything else that you do would have such a high focus on human rights and community development that I'm just curious as to what you might be interested in doing if it wasn't this. Yeah. So in the past, I guess I've dabbled in different spheres.

So I've been a musician and I greatly love that in Beijing. I was one of the founding members of something called the Beijing Beatles. So we played, you know, Beatles covers and we toured all around China. We toured in Mandarin. No, we sang in English. We sang in English, yeah. We toured in other places like in Hong Kong and Singapore. And I left to Bangladesh and the band and I'm touring in North Korea and all sorts of ridiculous things.

Yes, I'd probably be a profession. musician otherwise. I play bass. But yeah, I really don't think that I could do anything differently. This is the thing that I'm most passionate about. Yeah, you've definitely found the right place. Probably, yes. It also sounds as though you do a lot of reading. You read quite widely. Are there any other authors or practitioners that have really influenced your work? You spoke about Judith Herman and Martin Burrow, John Arden's Seeds and Sebastian Jungfers tribe. Is there anything? else people should check out if they're interested in knowing more about this area. Yeah, for me, probably the writer who's had the most influence on my life is probably

Franz Fannin, yeah. So, you know, his two seminal books, black-skinned white masks and wretched of the earth, I think this is, you know, anyone who's involved in anti-oppressive work and particularly in working with colonized peoples, you know, of which I am one. which greatly influenced the way that I not only saw the work, but also in which the way that I saw myself, I think it's really integral to the work. Yeah. So black-skinned white mass is effectively in looking at the psychopathology of colonized bodies. So it's unpacking issues around infiority and things like that. And then Ritch of the Earth is around looking at ways in

which I suppose people can heal from that. Yeah. Did the international development opportunities you mentioned earlier or anything like them still exist if people wanted to go and get that international experience? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, of course, it's a little bit more difficult as a result of the COVID pandemic.

Sure. However, there are different avenues in which people can take towards working overseas. And I know that the Australian government, they support paid volunteer positions, abroad in the Pacific and Asia and elsewhere. And, you know, there are, of course, are different positions that are advertised globally

in international development, places which people can look, you know, relief web, and sometimes places like ethical jobs have positions for overseas as well. Okay. And I guess there's a lot of fiction out there, but when you spoke about the issues that are going on at the moment in Afghanistan, I just thought if people wanted something that's not, too heavy to read a piece of fiction that absolutely sticks with me is Khaled Hosseini's books on

he wrote The Kite Runner, he wrote a thousand splendid suns and the mountains echoed and they brought me to tears. They're so incredibly compelling and beautiful and he just has such a wonderful way of writing but it's also a very good eye-opener as to the history of some of this stuff that's happening at the moment and what life is like there and yeah. So, I definitely recommend those, but is there any other reading that you can think of that people might use to help understand what's going on at the moment? Anything from Samantha Power, I think is really good. One book that greatly influenced me previously was called Chasing the Flame. So this was mostly talking about, and I think it's interesting because we were recording today on World Humanitarian Day.

This was a day that was chosen to commemorate humanitarian workers who had died in the, course of their work in the field and was largely to commemorate the Baghdadan bombing which Sergio Viro Domello was killed in. And a lot of the book was around his journey, but also around working in the field in general. Yeah, but there are many others. Unfortunately, they don't come to mine. I've had a little bit of a brain lapse, you could say. Oh, I've put you on the spot as well. There are many out there, absolutely. Lovely. If you think of any, flick them to me and I'll pop them in the show notes as well. I think this is going to be a resource heavy episode, which is fantastic. Is there anything else before we wrap up that you wanted to talk about, whether it's about

your work specifically or about social work in this area? No, I think that's great. I've talked enough and I really appreciate you having me on. It's been an absolute pleasure, especially I loved hearing about your drawing from your own migration experience and your settlement journey and finding a common purpose with people and that collective endeavor and your work, helping people to re-forge those severed ties and build those divides, working to socialize the profession as well. So from a professional perspective, the profession of social work through positive exposure experiences.

So helping people to understand what it is that we do. But also I loved hearing about your history with volunteering as a youth worker and mentoring. I think for anyone wanting to get into work in this sort of area, volunteering has got to be the best way to get your foot in the door and get that experience and exposure so that even before you graduate, you've got all that experience on your CV. And the benefit of just immersing yourself in an environment and culture and learning the language that's part of learning about a culture.

But yeah, your strategic approaches in terms of partnering with providers and the capacity building and your memory, membership on multiple boards is wonderful. You must get no sleep. But what I'm taking from this is just surround yourself with kindred spirits, you know, find your tribe, invest in people and relationships. And I love that despite where you've come from, where you've ended up, you've been in a privileged position relatively of being educated and then being able to do this work. So I think the more that we can get the word out there and the more people who study social work and have passions for these sorts of areas, I think the profession's in good hands.

Certainly, certainly. Yeah, thanks again, Sean. It's been an absolute pleasure. Thank you for your time. And yeah, I look forward to everyone else hearing about your experience. Beautiful. Thanks, Yasme. Thanks for joining me this week. If you would like to continue this discussion or ask anything of either myself or Sean,

please visit my anchor page. at anchor.fm slash social work spotlight. You can find me on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, or you can email SW Spotlight Podcast at gmail.com. I'd love to hear from you. Please also let me know if there is a particular topic you'd like discussed, or if you or another person you know would like to be featured on the show. Next episode's guest is Jonathan, currently working in research and using his experiences with people from diverse gender and sexual identities and those seeking asylum to develop and implement anti-oppressive research methods. He advocates for critically reflective practice and for greater collaboration within personal

and professional networks. I release a new episode every two weeks. Please subscribe to my podcast so you're notified when this next episode is available. See you next time.