(Salam)  سلام
2023, Video, Runtime: 2:09

What begins the word resist, is the second letter of my surname, زقوت (Zakout).

 قاوم (Qaawam), means resist, and it is the overarching theme and title of this graduate collection. Specifically in referral to my Palestinian identity, one that harbours great political connotations wherever I walk— one that begs of terror in any white-dominated room I enter; my bare existence serves as a form of resistance.

This collection considers dehumanisation of the Arab diaspora, and the impact of western media promoting a fear-mongering of Arab identities. Language is of great importance for these pieces, as cultural emblems are antagonised to provoke fear– language itself becomes a weapon. I will speak kind phrases in Arabic, and a white woman sitting across from me on the train will fear. Thus, Arabic makes for an immense and important conceptual majority of these works; it aims to disrupt western complacency by refusal to censor language in the face of rampant propaganda.