Bio :
Mukaddas Mijit is an ethnomusicologist, filmmaker, and artist. She is currently a postdoctoral fellow at ULB (Université Libre de Bruxelles) working on Uyghur artistic reaction in the diaspora after the Human rights crisis in the Uyghur region. She was born in Urumchi, the capital of the Uyghur Homeland. Upon arriving in Paris in 2003 to study classical music, she realized how little the outside world knew of Uyghur culture. She then began her studies as an ethnomusicologist, researching the staging of Uyghur dance and music, receiving her PhD in 2015. As a dancer, Mijit has performed internationally and collaborated with numerous performers, creating original works that infuse traditional Uyghur music and dance with other cultures and styles. As a filmmaker, she has produced several ethnographic documentary films, including “Qetiq, Rock’n Ürümchi” (nominated in the 10th Aljazeera International Documentary Film Festival in 2014), 30 boys : Uyghur Meshrep project. Most recently, she wrote and co-directed a medium-length film "Nikah" about the challenges that Uyghur women face from both traditional social mores and the highly oppressive political environment in China. She made a series of video work about the trauma that Uyghurs are enduring in recent years : Hear Uyghur Voices. Mijit is also a co-creator, co-director, and performer in Everybody Is Gone, an original interactive theatrical production designed to raise awareness about the ongoing crisis in the Uyghur Homeland. She is the co-creator and co-host of “WEghur Stories,” a podcast entirely about the global Uyghur diaspora. Most recently, she co-edited an anthology about Uyghur contemporary and oral literature in French, published by Jentayu.