The festival and symposium will explore the impact migrants have on their physical, social, cultural and economic environment as well as how cultural, spatial, legal and ideological forces affect rights, mobility and settlement.

By showing a wide variety of film clips from various periods and settings of the past 70 years, we aim to create an opportunity for an interdisciplinary dialogue raised by the selected films and film-making practices.

These questions relate to: Journeys - how do migrants negotiate their environment whilst on the move? Transition - how do migrants adapt to new systems, shape their communities and create temporary environments? The festival will end with a session on Negotiation and Accommodation: with films on establishing roots, acculturation and myths of return.

Migrant experience in the built environment relates to settlement patterns, modes of acculturation, contextual legal and immigration systems, the divergence of different generations’ experiences. It may even lead to return to the place of origin, a move onwards, or – for the children of migrants – a visit through memories to places from the past.

An interdisciplinary panel of experts from architecture, anthropology, film studies, planning, psychiatry and art will be joined by several of the film-makers, who will introduce their own films and participate in discussions at the end of each session. The tentative programme includes sections from: Encounters at the End of the World by Werner Herzog, The Statue of Liberty by Ken Burns, The Invisibles: by Gael García Bernal and Handsworth Songs by John Akomfrah. Films by Zelimir Zilnik, Marc Isaacs and Sérgio Tréfaut are among the many others planned for the day.

The festival is organised by Professor Laura Vaughan, Rastko Novakovic, Searle Kochberg and Dr Sonia Arbaci. It is funded by the UCL Environment Institute. We hope you can come for the day, but if not, feel free to drop into one of the sessions or come to the lunchtime showing of the wonderful Refuge England (Robert Vas, 1959), which follows a Hungarian refugee from his arrival in London as he roams the streets of the city in search of an elusive address given to him by a friend.

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Please note by signing up through this Eventbrite you are registering your interest for this event and will be able to receive a summary report once its ready.  We are not able to reserve you a seat as this is a drop in session - places are available on a first come first served basis, although we feel confident that enough room will be available to accommodate all.

You can find information on all our events through the UCL Environment Institute Monthly Newsletter. To subscribe to our monthly newsletter please email Marianne Knight