Reflecting on facets of Australian life and her experience as an Australian Muslim born in Eritrea, Manal Younus’ poetry covers an array of topics including racism, identity, discrimination, the empowerment of women and multiculturalism.
Younus is a young artist, but has already toured Australia since releasing her 2015 book of poetry ‘Reap’, speaking and reading in venues right around the country, including the Sydney Opera House. The Adelaide-based artist also represented Australia at the Georgetown Literary Festival in Penang, Malaysia, and was a finalist for Young South Australian of the Year in 2016.
Now, Younus still travels frequently around the country to perform and facilitate workshops for schools in each state and territory, as well as to speak at public events and conferences with a range of different audiences.
The wide-reaching consequence of racial and religious discrimination is one of the most frequent topics in her poetry, and something she has experience with on a personal level.
“The reason why I write is that there are some people don’t have as many rights and that is what I fight for,” Younus tells SBS Tigrinya. “That is why I have written all my life; so that we don’t forget those people.”
One of the more hard-hitting poems in Reap, entitled ‘Call him a terrorist’, considers those consequences from the point of view of a young man who wants to fit into Australian society, but is marginalised, and pushed toward violence.
She says the poem is based in part on her own experience of discrimination and those that she knows.
“I felt like that [harshly discriminated against], but the difference is that I am not a violent person and I don’t resort to violence, but we know that many people when they are pushed to anger they might become violent.”
As in the below excerpt from the poem, Younus portrays a young man who feels disconnected from the culture of his parents and wants to live a regular Australian life. Yet he encounters discrimination that she says could push him to lead a violent life.
It encourages readers to consider their personal biases, and whether their individual behaviour toward people like this young man is contributing to social divides.
A politically frustrated young kid
Full of zeal, like any other
Abandoned the culture of his parents
Probably never read the holy book
Forgot to pray to God
Because he was too busy trying to be a part of
‘your’ world.
After years of self-loathing and confusion
Contributing to this country
Being your neighbour,
You have the nerve to question if he is on your team
Just because he didn’t lose himself.
All that was left was for him to lose himself
- 'Call him a terrorist' (excerpt.), Manal Younus, Reap (Griffin Press, 2015)
As far as extremism and violence is concerned, Younus believes part of the problem’s root cause is bad ideology.
“I am not an expert, but there are bad ideologies and this ideology did not come from here and people were being pushed to adopt that ideology.”
As part of her activism she hopes to highlight the plight of young Africans who have been stereotyped by some sections of the media as being part of ‘African gangs’.
“If you look at the African kids getting into trouble, we need to ask why do they act out?,” she asks. “Is it because they are isolated? They feel like they have nothing, are not being heard, and even when they do their best, they are still discriminated against.”
Younus used to work in activism and in the settlement of refugees, but says she later realised her time would be better spent working on her poetry, and helping other young writers develop their own voices.
“This way if I just work with young people and help them to write their own stories instead of me writing stories for them, with this I can go anywhere and no one will stop me from speaking, whether it is in conferences, community groups, schools and things like that.”
Asked about what path she took to get to her position now, Younus says she had originally hoped to tell stories through journalism.
“I wanted to become a journalist and studied journalism and international relations at university,” she says. “My wish was to write stories that I had heard from my parents and community and tell these stories to the world. At first I used to write poems only for myself just to process what was happening around me. When I started performing to people, many liked it and I continued.”
Manal Younus’s popularity has also spread beyond the communities she speaks about, and poetry circles. She has presented at the likes of TEDx conferences, the National Multicultural Women’s Conference, the Adelaide Festival of Ideas and Open State Festival as well as featuring on ABC’s Q&A program as a panellist.
