1000 Dreams campaign humanizes European refugee communities through powerful photo-storytelling on social media

Hootsuite, the global leader in social media management, has joined forces with Witness Change, a non-profit organization that exists to end human rights violations for marginalized communities, to bring heart and humanity to refugee stories.

Announced today, on World Refugee Day, Hootsuite has leveraged its Enterprise platform to enable the 1000 Dreams campaign—a photo-storytelling project of strength, struggle, and dreams— authored by 40 refugee storytellers in Europe, with the goal of creating a global movement to change the narrative of the refugee experience.

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“Refugees are often depicted through an outside lens in society,” said Robin Hammond, Founder of Witness Change. “At times they are depicted as threats to the land where they’ve settled, and in other instances, as victims. It’s not that simple, so it was our goal to help change that narrative by telling the stories from the more complex perspectives of the refugees themselves.”

Witness Change leveraged the power of the Hootsuite dashboard to plan and manage the campaign, and will utilize Hootsuite’s powerful social listening tools to help measure the impact of the campaign and resulting changes in sentiment. Pro bono support from internal experts at Hootsuite was also provided.

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In order to collect a goal of 1,000 stories, Witness Change is supporting refugee storytellers from diverse backgrounds with skills training, equipment, and mentorship to conduct interviews and photograph refugees. To date, nearly 700 refugees living in Europe have shared their stories of strength, challenges and dreams.

“Witness Change specializes in amplifying the voices of marginalized groups,” said Eva Taylor, Corporate Social Responsibility Director at Hootsuite. “At Hootsuite, we work in the world of social media and our tools can play a critical role in amplifying the messages of underrepresented groups across all subsets of society. This partnership was a natural fit for us as we work with Witness Change to use the power of social media to tell these incredibly powerful stories. Social media is a great equalizer, and provides opportunities for important stories to be heard by a global audience.”

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