About Mushtarak

Through decades of repression, followed by years of war and displacement, these spaces between Syrians receded. Experiences grew apart across the globe, memory fragmented, and thousands of stories were silenced. Much of what we experience began to unfold without finding its way into a public conversation through which we could understand ourselves and our society and ask together: What happened to us? And what should we do about what happened?

Mushtarak was born from this very need—as an attempt to reclaim a space in which we can begin searching for answers to questions that remain open and for forms of shared ground that have yet to be discovered or built. It was also born from the need to engage with difference as one of the conditions for building that shared ground.

Here, we listen to stories, examine social and cultural transformations, discuss ideas, engage in dialogue with people who bring lived experience and expertise, and experiment with new forms of meeting and working together. Every experience may open a question, every question may lead to knowledge, and every piece of knowledge can become the beginning of a new dialogue.

We seek to make Mushtarak a space in which Syrians can see themselves in their different forms and listen to one another in the plurality of their voices and experiences—a space that preserves what they have lived through, understands what has changed, opens windows onto experiences from around the world, and helps imagine what has not yet happened. We are not searching for shared ground that already exists; rather, we are exploring the possibility of building it.