Deeyah Khan is a documentary filmmaker and the founder of Fuuse, an independent media, arts and education company. She has won two Emmys, a BAFTA, an RTS and two Peabody Awards for her films. Her debut, the Emmy-winning Banaz: A love story, covered the phenomenon of ‘honour’ killing, focussing on the murder of Banaz Mahmod, a young Kurdish woman living in London. She has spent years exploring male violence, filming with Islamist extremists, former jihadis, current and former white supremacists and anti-abortion terrorists. In 2016, she became the first UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for artistic freedom and creativity.
Maryam Pasha is the Director and Curator of TEDxLondon and TEDxLondonWomen and co-host of TEDxLondon’s Climate Curious podcast. She has been coaching TED and TEDx speakers for ten years. The talks she has worked on have been distributed by TED to over eighteen million viewers, influenced UK government policy and most importantly helped people use their voice to make change.
In 2015 she started coaching companies, NGOs and individuals to develop their speaking skills and authentic voice. Her clients include: Climate Leadership Initiative, Rocky Mountain Institute, Oceankind, CREO, Tata Consultancy Services, UCL and Facebook. Maryam has 10 years of experience in the human rights and charity sector and a background in psychology. She is currently a Visiting Fellow at the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship at the University of Oxford where she focuses on impact storytelling.
Sahar Zand is a reporter and filmmaker with a special focus on under-reported human-interest stories, from conflict and human rights abuses, to gender and mental health issues. She has fronted and produced a range of award-winning global stories, including for the BBC, Channel 4, ITV and Vice. Sahar was born in Iran and lived there until she was 12, before escaping with family to avoid political persecution. After several years between refugee camps across Europe, she eventually settled in the UK. Her radio documentary ‘Me, the refugee’ is a compelling insight into her life experiences.
Sahar’s documentary ‘Britain’s Virginity Clinics uncovered’, for ITV’s Exposure, saw Sahar going undercover to expose the clinics making money from so-called virginity testing and hymenoplasty. IKWRO played an instrumental role in the success of the documentary. In her radio documentary ‘My sister Banaz – killed for loving the wrong man’, for BBC Outlook, Sahar interviewed Payzee Mahmod, IKWRO Campaigner about IKWRO’s Safeguard Futures Ban Child Marriage campaign. Sahar regularly gives talks about journalism, storytelling and filmmaking at festivals and universities around the world, she is regularly interviewed about her work and has been featured The Times, Financial Times, The Spectator, Huffington Post and NPR.