Being Stateless

What are some of the questions that listeners can take with them from this podcast series?

In this final episode we begin by exploring some of the unresolvable questions around what it means to make home as migrants – whether stateless or not - on stolen sovereign Aboriginal land.

We then listen to a recording of a conversation held in early October 2024 between our host, Jordana, and two participants in the oral history project and podcast: Niro Kandasamy and Hasib Hourani. This conversation provides a discussion of what an oral history project like this offers – what are its opportunities, possibilities, and limitations.

Find the Oral Histories Project on the Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness’s website.

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Being Stateless is a podcast about people in Australia who have been stateless. About their memories, experiences, and histories.

Across a series of oral history interviews, Jordana Silverstein – a historian and descendant of stateless refugees – has brought together people living in Australia who share stories, insights, knowledge and experiences of statelessness.

In this podcast series, join Jordana and the interviewees to learn about how we can understand and describe statelessness, citizenship, and what it means to belong somewhere. 

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This episode was recorded and produced on the lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders, past and present. Sovereignty has never been ceded. This always was and always will be Aboriginal land. We are grateful to First Nations writers, activists, scholars and artists from across the continent, from whom we continue to learn so much.

This podcast comes from the Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness and is funded in part by the Australian Research Council. Michael Green was the Story Editor and it was produced by Greta Robenstone.

This clip at the end of the episode is an excerpt from the following interview:

• Timea Partos interviewed by Jordana Silverstein for the Statelessness in Australia oral history project, 17 August 2023, TRC 7365/5. National Library of Australia.

In this episode we meet Kalyani Inpakumar, a Tamil woman who lives in Sydney. She came to Australia in 1990, coming to meet her then-husband, with whom she would have two daughters. Kalyani describes herself, with pride, as having come from Tamil Eelam.

We learn about Kalyani’s migration journey, which took in multiple countries. And we hear her stories of community-building, of how she now works with Tamil community organisations and newly arrived refugees. The building of spaces and cultures where migrants and citizens can work together and learn from each sits at the centre of Kalyani’s story. This active creation of informal connections and networks offers a vital perspective of how statelessness is negotiated.

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Being Stateless is a podcast about people in Australia who have been stateless. About their memories, experiences, and histories.

Across a series of oral history interviews, Jordana Silverstein – a historian and descendant of stateless refugees – has brought together people living in Australia who share stories, insights, knowledge and experiences of statelessness.

In this podcast series, join Jordana and the interviewees to learn about how we can understand and describe statelessness, citizenship, and what it means to belong somewhere. 

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This episode was created and produced on the lands of the Wurundjeri and Tugagal people. We pay our respects to their Elders, past and present. Sovereignty has never been ceded. This always was and always will be Aboriginal land. We are grateful to First Nations writers, activists, scholars and artists from across the continent, from whom we continue to learn so much.

This podcast comes from the Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness and is funded in part by the Australian Research Council. Michael Green was the Story Editor and it was produced by Greta Robenstone.

In Episode Three we meet Mohin Shahin, a Palestinian man who was stateless when he was born in Lebanon in 1956. His parents had been forced to move to South Lebanon after the Nakba, and he and his siblings grew up in Lebanon before some of them moved as young adults to Australia. Mohin migrated in 1987 with his wife and young daughter. Becoming an Australian citizen, Mohin tells us, was a big moment in his life. He lives in Adelaide.

In this interview we learn about these parts of his life, learning about how he negotiated life and bureaucracy in Lebanon and through migration. We hear about his family’s work – his family owns and runs a large business – and about how the family supports each other. They are dispersed, but they retain their Palestinianness as fundamental to who they are. Through Mohin’s words and memories, we learn of the effects of exile that sit alongside statelessness. 

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Being Stateless is a podcast about people in Australia who have been stateless. About their memories, experiences, and histories.

Across a series of oral history interviews, Jordana Silverstein – a historian and descendant of stateless refugees – has brought together people living in Australia who share stories, insights, knowledge and experiences of statelessness.

In this podcast series, join Jordana and the interviewees to learn about how we can understand and describe statelessness, citizenship, and what it means to belong somewhere. 

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This episode was recorded and produced on the lands of the Wurundjeri and Kaurna people. We pay our respects to their Elders, past and present. Sovereignty has never been ceded. This always was and always will be Aboriginal land. We are grateful to First Nations writers, activists, scholars and artists from across the continent, from whom we continue to learn so much.

This podcast comes from the Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness and is funded in part by the Australian Research Council. Michael Green was the Story Editor and it was produced by Greta Robenstone.

This episode introduces us to Guta Goldstein. A Jewish Holocaust survivor in her 90s who was born in Poland, Guta came to Australia as a nineteen year old, one of the last surviving members of her family. She now lives in Melbourne.

After spending the post-war years in Italy, Guta and her remaining cousin migrated to Australia, where she met her husband, had children, and rebuilt her life. Finding work, coming to understand Australian culture, and the process of discovering herself as a writer later in life, provide the contours of Guta’s story. Ultimately, for Guta, being stateless is “a terrible thing”. And through her words we learn what that can mean. 

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Being Stateless is a podcast about people in Australia who have been stateless. About their memories, experiences, and histories.

Across a series of oral history interviews, Jordana Silverstein – a historian and descendant of stateless refugees – has brought together people living in Australia who share stories, insights, knowledge and experiences of statelessness.

In this podcast series, join Jordana and the interviewees to learn about how we can understand and describe statelessness, citizenship, and what it means to belong somewhere. 

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This episode was created, recorded and produced on the lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders, past and present. Sovereignty has never been ceded. This always was and always will be Aboriginal land. We are grateful to First Nations writers, activists, scholars and artists from across the continent, from whom we continue to learn so much.

This podcast comes from the Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness and is funded in part by the Australian Research Council. Michael Green was the Story Editor and it was produced by Greta Robenstone.

In this episode we hear from a diverse group of people who have had experiences of statelessness. We come to understand how they each define and describe what statelessness is, how it feels, and how it is remembered. We learn how people describe and analyse their relationships to countries and nation-states, and the processes they have gone through in order to migrate and acquire citizenship.

Poignant questions of belonging, in-betweenness, and home get raised to surface. And we learn how people think about their relationships to Australia. Through these critical anecdotes, stories, and reminiscences, we see how each of us is a product of the histories we carry.

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Being Stateless is a podcast about people in Australia who have been stateless. About their memories, experiences, and histories.

Across a series of oral history interviews, Jordana Silverstein – a historian and descendant of stateless refugees – has brought together people living in Australia who share stories, insights, knowledge and experiences of statelessness.

In this podcast series, join Jordana and the interviewees to learn about how we can understand and describe statelessness, citizenship, and what it means to belong somewhere. 

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This podcast was created and produced on the lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders, past and present. Sovereignty has never been ceded. This always was and always will be Aboriginal land. We are grateful to First Nations writers, activists, scholars and artists from across the continent, from whom we continue to learn so much.

This podcast comes from the Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness and is funded in part by the Australian Research Council. Michael Green was the Story Editor and it was produced by Greta Robenstone.

This episode contains excerpts from the following interviews:

• Timea Partos interviewed by Jordana Silverstein for the Statelessness in Australia oral history project, 17 August 2023, TRC 7365/5. National Library of Australia.
• Dalya Sabawi interviewed by Jordana Silverstein for the Statelessness in Australia oral history project, 8 December 2022, TRC 7365/4. National Library of Australia.
• Irmgard Hanner interviewed by Jordana Silverstein for the Statelessness in Australia oral history project, 22 August 2022, TRC 7365/1. National Library of Australia.
• Joseph Szwarcberg interviewed by Jordana Silverstein for the Statelessness in Australia oral history project, 23 August 2022, TRC 7365/2. National Library of Australia.
• The document in our Podcast logo is from National Archives of Australia: B78, 1957/STAWSKI S