The main challenges for religious leaders in addressing sexual and gender-based violence are intimately connected to the fact that sexuality is a dee… - Azza Karam

After about two years in this fascinating and dynamic environment, I realized that I did not want to be teaching only. I missed the actual work—working 24 hours a day on cases and situations and peoples’ lives. I suddenly found myself in a very academic context, torn between a university which was very English-dominated, in a country which was struggling to find its own voice—Northern Ireland.

We are living in the context of a generation of youth—which is over 60% of our populations—that has grown up as part of a global youth culture equipped with mass communication technologies and amid huge challenges to established powers.

My early studies and work brought me very much within the sphere and domain of religious groups, particularly Islamic ones, but my perceptions and understanding started from my family and my university experience. So my interest, and the reason that I became involved in these topics, stem from a very personal and professional place.