Mrs Smythe says that as an English teacher she has been helping others to write, she saw it necessary to do a course to improve her skills in interviewing and writing articles.
Keypoints
- Research about Assyrians in Australia
- The similarities among migrants’ experiences
- Australian role in saving Assyrians from massacre during WWI
Julie is very involved in her church as she is an active member of the uniting church.
Getting to know Assyrians through her teaching profession as a language teacher, Julie discovered the deep roots of the origin of the Christian church, ways of worship and so many old traditions in the Assyrian people.
During the covid-19 online teaching, Julie became more involved in working with an Assyrian student (Tara John), who is studying to become a teacher. She has been very helpful in assisting teachers communicating with Assyrian students.
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“During COVID-19 online teaching, I got to know more about Assyrians through another Assyrian student”
When asked why she chose her theses to be about Assyrian, Mrs Smyths explained that she has a mixed heritage from Chinese to German to English. She believes her great Grandfather was in the first ship that arrived from China in 1852. He wa exiled from his country.
Her heritage from her mother’s side is German, and many Germans came to Australia in the eighteen hundreds, for better life. She says that she is interested in immigration, and from her knowledge about her Assyrian students, she can see the connections with many of us who have the courage and resilience and feel the hardship the Assyrians facing in their country of origin from inequality in religious and ethnic discrimination, yet they are resilient and true survivals.
Julie recently started her research to write her thesis, her work will basically focus on interviews with people who had fled their country and seen difficulties and bad experiences during their journey to Australia. She was also inspired by a book by an Australian Army Captain during WWI, by the name of Stanley Savage, who played a great role in saving the lives of tens of thousands of Assyrian refugees from Urmia in Iran, as he ordered his regiment to protect the fleeing refugees from being massacred by Persian and Kurdish tribes.
“Because my mixed European, Chinese heritage, I have strong feelings towards immigrants”
Mrs Smythe see there is a lot of things in common with the Assyrian people in Australia and the Australian ANZAC spirit of mateship, responsibility, and courage.
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