Voices of Resilience: Researchers Rebuilding Hope in Tigray

Part II: Literature as Resistance: How Dr. Tesfaye Finds Hope Amid Crisis

Hello, my good human. I am Lefteris and in this newsletter, I try to give a platform to academics who don’t get as many chances to showcase their work as I believe they should. I try to understand their lives, their work and what affects their everyday routine. If that sounds like something you'd be interested feel free to subscribe.

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Picture by Oscar Espinosa/Shutterstock

Long after the dust of conflict settles, the task of rebuilding lives and fostering reconciliation begins. For Dr. Tesfaye, literature is a powerful tool in this journey. My talk with this Associate professor of literature, showed me how studying culture can become an act of resistance, hope, restructuring and healing.

Gender, Media, and Social Change

Tesfaye's academic journey reflects his commitment to understanding society's deeper currents. His PhD research focused on the construction of gender in Ethiopian Amharic serial dramas, examining how television—a government-controlled medium—shapes and reflects social values.

"The dramas are patriarchal in structure," he explains, noting how they continue to promote traditional social constructs. In his observations, there are some stakeholders that appear to be pushing for progress toward a less patriarchal society—albeit slowly and gradually.

His analysis reveals a crucial truth about social transformation: "The issue of gender is quite soft, and the change we see in media and in society is very gradual and very slow. This takes time because it's part of our culture and it's been with the communities for a very long time."

The Power of Words in Times of Crisis

Dr. Tesfaye’s work always has a societal aspect of it. He tries to see the social impact of different aspects of Ethiopian society. However, I wanted to find out how the events of the war affected the way of his work and his way of thinking. His answered began with a very impactful “I am a student of literature”

When he was telling me these things, they didn’t just sound like academic platitudes to my ears. During the war in Tigray—what Tesfaye describes as "the worst time in his life"—books became his refuge, a way to maintain hope when reality offered little. His coping mechanism was to read, study, and never lose sight of humanity's capacity for both destruction and healing.

War is something that I have always struggled to understand. I, of course, come from a privileged background, never experienced war and even grew up in a very loving home with next to no violence. It is somewhat of a naive point of view, I get it, but I always thought that if you put your ideas forward you should be able to support them with arguments. And if you can’t, then go back and rethink your ideas, don’t start punching people. Tesfaye said basically the same thing, but only in the elegant way a literature major can put it.

“War is really the worst choice that really shows the weakness of the politicians. If they choose war, it means that they don't have the reasons. They don't have the ideas. They have finished ideas and yeah, if people finish ideas and reasons, they will go for physical fight.”

Media's Role in Conflict and Peace

When discussing Ethiopia's media landscape, Tesfaye's critique is both pointed and comprehensive. "The media altogether was not responsible to stand for peace and to stand for the justice of people," he states firmly.

Tesfaye wanted to make sure that I understood that he doesn’t mean a specific portion of the media. Or media coming from a specific geography in Ethiopia. He meant the media altogether.

“For people to live, they have to have peace. Peace of mind and peaceful relationship, peaceful co-existence. The media haven't been doing this. They haven't been supporting this.”

Unfortunately, however, people don’t have another option at this time. To know the current situation, there isn’t any choice. They have to either watch the mainstream media or the social media. He mentions that of course there are some good people in the media, and they live because of those good people. Their hope gets rekindled because of the good people they see.

Cultural Preservation Through Proverbs

One of Tesfaye's most fascinating projects involves analysing Tigrinya proverbs, particularly their representation of people with disabilities. These proverbs, he explains, are "very precise statements of principles... time-tested experiences of the people.” What I find extremely moving from my talk with Tesfaye, is the heart-warming point of view he was about life.

Consider the proverb: "A neighbour close by is better than a brother far away." Through Tesfaye's analysis, this simple saying reveals complex truths about community, proximity, and human relationships. "Neighbourhood is not only about people living nearby," he explains. "Neighbourhood also is understood in terms of regions, in terms of nations as well."

The Wisdom of Elders

A big question for me was the research methodology Tesfaye used to analyse different proverbs. He, of course, considers academic sources, but he seeks out "culturally competent" individuals to help interpret proverbs and their evolving meanings. When he used the term “culturally competent” people, I couldn’t really understand who those people can be? Other academic peers? His supervisors perhaps? When I suggested that, he smiled and he told me culturally competent people are the elders in the community that have been using these proverbs for many years.

"I identify people who are thought to be competent in the culture," he explains. Through a snowball sampling approach, one elder leads him to another, creating a network of cultural knowledge that bridges academic theory and lived experience.

Challenging Stereotypes Through Research

If Tesfaye wants to understand proverbs and their effect in culture and society, he needs to understand the context, and so he tries to immerse himself as much as he can in the culture. In the work he did on proverbs about people with disability, he found that most proverbs depict people with disabilities negatively. That they can’t work, they have bad behaviour etc. persons with disabilities are used as a metaphor to explain something weak and something negative.

But Tesfaye's goal isn't just to document these biases—it's to challenge them. "I want the audience to understand and change the view," he asserts. His research promotes alternative narratives that recognize agency, capability, and the importance of inclusion.

The Path Forward

As Tigray works to rebuild, scholars like Tesfaye and Tewelde remind us that physical reconstruction must be accompanied by cultural and spiritual healing. Through their work, we see how academic research can become a form of resistance against despair, a celebration of resilience, and a pathway to understanding and offering solutions.

In the words of both Tesfaye and his colleague Tewelde, research in Tigray isn't just about filling gaps in knowledge—it's about healing wounds, building bridges, and imagining a future where words create understanding instead of division, where culture becomes a source of strength rather than conflict, and where education leads not just to degrees, but to deeper human connections.

Both Tewelde and Tesfaye exemplify resilience and commitment. Their stories remind us that research, whether scientific or cultural, is not just about knowledge—it’s about humanity. These academics continue to fight for a better future, even as the world’s attention turns elsewhere.