The Freethinker Prize 2019 will be awarded to author Salman Rushdie and director Barbara Miller for their artistic work and their advocacy to an enlightened world, for upholding humanist values and for defending the freedom of art and expression.. The award ceremony will take place on 15 November 2019, from 18.15 in the Rothausbar in Zurich. *** The event is fully booked ***

Barbara Miller and Salman Rushdie will accept the prize in person. The laudation will be followed by a discussion with the two awardees. The ceremony will be broadcast live on Youtube and Facebook (URLs will be published in advance on free-thought.ch).

In her two films Forbidden Voices and #Female Pleasure, director Barbara Miller has given voice to women who have been oppressed or even abused by governments or religious communities. Both films have played a major role in making these women and their stories known to the general public.

Salman Rushdie's stories inspire us to contemplate, through his novel characters we are invited to think critically about how the world works and we experience the difficulties individuals face, who are torn back and forth between cultures with different value systems. Repeatedly he also takes on the grotesque sides of religious convictions in his stories.