Global:Local - Cultural Identity in London

Abdul-Rehman Malik, Murad Qureshi, Suhayla El-Bushra and Nadir Nahdi celebrate and interrogate the plurality of cultural experience amongst young Londoners. Abdul-Rehman Malik is a journalist, educator and organiser, currently programmes manager for the Radical Middle Way, an organisation that gives young Muslims the inspiration and tools to enable positive social change, promote social justice and combat exclusion and violence. Suhayla El-Bushra is a playwright based in Hove. Her credits at the Royal Court include Pigeons, in Weekly Rep as part of Open Court, which embarks on a 20 date London schools tour this November. On television, she is currently writing for Hollyoaks and other credits include a feature screenplay for Jeva Films (supported by the Film Council), an interactive teen drama and several scripts for Doctors. Her theatre credits include 66 Books at the Bush Theatre and Cuckoo, produced at the Unicorn next year. Murad Qureshi is a London Assembly member for the Labour party and is Chair of the London Assembly Environment Committee. He grew up in Central London where he attended his local comprehensive school before receiving a degree from the University of East Anglia and an MSc in Environmental Economics from UCL. He worked in Housing and Regeneration for 15 years establishing Housing Associations and Co-ops in the East End in response to chronic housing needs. He was an Executive Committee member of SERA (1994-2000) campaigning on green issues and a former member of the City of Westminster Council (1998-2006) representing the neighbourhoods he grew up in. Murad is a former Board Member of BRAC UK, an International NGO that seeks to alleviate poverty and empower the poor in the UK and abroad. Nadir Nahdi is currently studying an Msc in‎ Religion in International Relations and the Contemporary World at the London School of Economics. He spent the previous year in Amman working for UN IRAQ to support the Government of Iraq in modernizing its public sector and Education Policy. Simultaneously he was completing his studies in Arabic Language and Islamic Studies at the Qasid Institute. He looks back at his previous experiences at Chatham House, Jesuit Refugee Service, An-Nisa Society and the Radical Middle Way as him “simply trying to find his place in this quagmire of misunderstanding, violence and ignorance”, and hopes to build a career and future combating such problems. He has worked extensively in student drama, theatre and film.