SWANA stands for Southwest Asian and North African. This term is used to describe the region commonly referred to as the Middle East. SWANA is a “way to distinguish the region in geographical terms, rather than “political terms” as defined by the Western world” (SWANA-LA).
S.W.A.N.A. is a decolonial word for the South West Asian/ North African (S.W.A.N.A.) region in place of Middle Eastern, Near Eastern, Arab World or Islamic World that have colonial, Eurocentric, and Orientalist origins and are created to conflate, contain and dehumanize our people. We use SWANA to speak to the diversity of our communities and to forward the most vulnerable in our liberation.