Christina M. Paschyn - Northwestern University in Qatar

Christina M. Paschyn, MS and MA, is a multimedia journalist and award-winning documentary filmmaker. She has reported for major news organizations across the globe, including the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, TIME.com in London, E News in Johannesburg and KVRR-TV as the station’s congressional correspondent in Washington, D.C. She delivered live shots and interviews about the rocket strikes on Be’er Sheva during the 2009 Israel-Gaza War for multiple news outlets, including WEWS News Channel 5 in Cleveland. Her work has appeared on CNN, Euronews, the Christian Science Monitor, Women’s eNews, Chime for Change, Al-Fanar Media and in THINK. Magazine, Harper’s Bazaar Arabia, Cosmopolitan Middle East and the Chicago Journal, among other publications.

In fall 2015, she completed her first feature-length documentary film, “A Struggle for Home: The Crimean Tatars.” The film chronicles the rich and often tragic history of the Crimean Tatar people, the Muslim-Turkic indigenous population of the Crimean Peninsula, from ancient times to the aftermath of the 2014 Russian annexation of the peninsula. It premiered at the Al Jazeera International Documentary Film Festival in November 2015. It was also accepted into Docs for Sale at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) and has since played in several other film festivals and professional venues, including the European Parliament in Brussels. It won Best International Film at the DC Independent Film Festival in March 2016 and Best Documentary at the Poppy Jasper International Film Festival in April 2016. The film is also the winner of a 2015 Silver Spotlight Documentary Film Award.

From March 2014-September 2015, Paschyn served as a co-investigator on a grant (UREP 15-035-5-013) from the Qatar National Research Fund (a member of Qatar Foundation) that utilized survey and ethnographic research to study the impact of female majaalis (traditional gatherings) on Qatari women’s participation in civil society.

In her work as a journalist, Paschyn has covered a variety of under-reported issues such as Qatari women’s education and employment, education policies in the GCC, deteriorating press freedom in Ukraine, net neutrality, and the Chernobyl nuclear disaster anniversary and its relevance to the Fukushima nuclear crisis.

Paschyn earned a MA in Middle East Studies from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev as a Rotary International Ambassadorial Scholar. There, she volunteered as a video producer for Step Forward, an NGO working to empower the Bedouin population in the city of Rahat. Paschyn also earned a BS and a MS in broadcast journalism from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University through its Accelerated Master’s Degree Program. Paschyn also speaks Ukrainian and is studying Arabic.

JOUR 201 Reporting, Writing and Multimedia Storytelling
JOUR 203 Multimedia Storytelling
JOUR 342 Advanced Online Storytelling
JOUR 390 Special Topics: Covering Gender Issues in Journalism
JOUR 390 Special Topics: Empowering Women through Feminist Media Production
JOUR 390 Special Topics: Installing a Multimedia Majlis
JOUR 390 Special Topics: Undergraduate Research in Media
MIT 330 Special Topics: Creative Collaboration

Media, journalism and mass communication
Gender and human rights
Qatari women’s civic engagement
Representations of Qatari women in local media
How women’s rights activists use social media to engage with Middle Eastern audiences and advance their causes

Best International Film, DC Independent Film Festival 2016. For film, “A Struggle for Home: The Crimean Tatars.”

Best Documentary, Poppy Jasper International Film Festival 2016. For film, “A Struggle for Home: The Crimean Tatars.”

Silver Award Winner, Spotlight Documentary Film Awards 2015. For film, “A Struggle for Home: The Crimean Tatars.”

Qatari Women: Engagement and Empowerment. (March 30, 2014–September 30, 2015). Co-Investigator, Qatar National Research Fund, $150,000 USD.

Winner of Best Paper Award in "The Role of State Policies on Family Formation and Stability" pillar. For article: Kane, T., Mir, S., Mitchell, J., Paschyn, C. M., & Pike, K. (2015). In Majaalis Al-Hareem: The Complex Professional and Personal Choices of Qatari Women. DIFI Family Research and Proceedings, Volume-issue 4, starting page 0. Journal published by Qatar Foundation.

Northwestern University in Qatar “Unity Award,” May 2014, for the QNRF UREP grant, “Qatari Women: Engagement and Empowerment.”

Paschyn, C. M. (Oct. 2015). A Struggle for Home: The Crimean Tatars. Documentary film. Festival premiere at Al Jazeera International Documentary Film Festival, Doha, Qatar. For full list of screenings, visit: http://astruggleforhome.com.

Kane, T., Mir, S., Mitchell, J., Paschyn, C. M., & Pike, K. (2015). In Majaalis Al-Hareem: The Complex Professional and Personal Choices of Qatari Women. DIFI Family Research and Proceedings, Volume-issue 4, starting page 0. Journal published by Qatar Foundation. (Winner of Best Paper Award for "The Role of State Policies on Family Formation and Stability" pillar.)

Paschyn, C. M. (2014). Check Your Orientalism at the Door: Edward Said, Sanjay Seth, and the Adequacy of Western Pedagogy. The Journal of General Education, Volume 63, Numbers 2-3, pp. 222-231. Journal published by Penn State University Press.

Paschyn, C. M. (May 1, 2014). Educated and ambitious, Qatari women nudge their way into the office. Christian Science Monitor.

Paschyn, C. M. (December 17, 2013). Qatar’s Invisible Women. Chime for Change.

Paschyn, C. M. (October 25, 2013). Zig-Zagging Education Policies Leave Qatari Students Behind. Al Fanar.

Paschyn, C. M. (2012) Qatar: Anatomy of a Globalized State. THINK. magazine.