Dr Mandy Hughes

Given links between women's economic empowerment and IPV reduction, the 3Es to Freedom: Education, Employment, Empowerment programme aimed to empower refugee and migrant women to successfully navigate their futures by developing confidence, building knowledge and skills, and broadening their experiences to become stronger through their connections to community. The ultimate goal of the program was to support participants to secure sustainable employment of their choice, enabling them to move away from IPV should they need to. Making community connections and developing social networks were key to success in building the participants' confidence and skills, empowering them to pursue employment. In addition, the program supported the women to embark on social enterprise employment projects. Referring to this program as a case study, this chapter will describe and critically reflect on the success of this innovative intervention. The programme was delivered by a non-government organisation in Australia and supported by a long-term university research partnership.

Sharing refugee stories through visual research can be a powerful way to educate communities and promote social inclusion. This becomes even more effective when refugee participants are deeply involved in the process of their representation and feel a sense of ownership of the research products. In this chapter I discuss considerations around refugee representation and collaboration by examining two projects from non-metropolitan Australia. In these case studies, films and other visual products were co-created to inform locals, programme funders, and broader audiences about the lived experiences of diverse community members who had unique settlement stories. Telling these stories enhanced the participants’ sense of belonging and community connectedness and also challenged negative narratives about refugees that had been previously promoted by conservative governments and xenophobic community members. Audience interactions with these visual products demonstrated a greater sense of compassion and understanding of the newcomers, as well as a desire to welcome them and support them.