”None but ourselves can free our mind”
Stop-motion movie workshop in Prishtina
“None but ourselves can free our mind” stop-motion movie workshop, the first in the line of different events organized within the frame of the Regional action days against discrimination took place on 17th of May, in Prishtina. The workshop gathered around 20 young people from different Kosovo communities aiming to explore, deepen and finally artistically address the problem of discrimination.
The activity was opened with the experiential learning process, a role play game through which each of participants ‘’checked out how is being in someone else’s skin’’ and how certain layers of our identity influence our life. The game at the same tackled different stereotypes and prejudices and reflections during the following discussion served as a base for future scenarios.
After a brief presentation on stop-motion movies methods and techniques and sharing of some useful hints on story-telling, participants have chosen the cases they found the most interesting, aiming to create an awareness raising movies.
Number of stories related to social exclusion was told, many of them discussed and some of them turn to a several interesting scenarios! The movies are about to be done… Stay tuned!
All for football, football for all
Plemetina Youth Football tournament
Plemetina is a little multiethnic village around just 14 kilometers outside of Prishtina, the capital city of Kosovo. Around 3000 people from different Kosovo communities (Serbian, Albanian, Roma, Ashkali, Egyptian, and Bosnian) live in this place.
However, the inhabitants of Plemetina face many issues on everyday level and their rights are seriously violated. The village is placed nearby two coal power-plants (Kosovo A and Kosovo B) and it’s extremely polluted. Often water and electricity cuts are making life of its people even harder. Most of them are unemployed and live in poverty, with no cultural, educational, public and other accesses. The village is furthermore isolated, giving the fact that there’s no exiting regular public transport that would connect its inhabitants to bigger places, such as Obiliq/Obilic or Prishtinë/Pristina. Some few hundred meters outside of the village there is a social housing quarter. It is constituted of two apartment blocks and around 50 families inhabiting the buildings. They are mostly Internally Displaced Persons, who had to flee during the Kosovo conflict.
And even though all the Plemetina inhabitants live peacefully together, everyday life is usually shared within own community and due to the struggles for bare necessities/basic existential needs, it’s not often that people come together and take over an active role in fights for their rights, violated on many different levels. Nevertheless, Plemetina Youth is ready to ’’be the change’’ and take the future of their village into their hands. Over the last couple of years, through different activies organised within GAIA, they have been campaigning to reclaim their rights and they have taken over the active role towards the peacefull and righteous society.
Plemetina Youth Football tournament “All for football, football for all” has been a step forward in this direction. All the youth came together and played in randomly mixed teams, regardless their ethnic and cultural backround, sending a strong and clear message to all Kosovo youth – that it’s about time to come together and unite in struggles for a better future.
Plemetina youth football tournament took place within the frame of Regional Action days against discrimination. Around 40 young people played together! Many more came to cheer and support the players…
Some stories are to be written, some stories are to be told… their story is to be seen! Thank you Plemetins! You gave us all a priceless lesson today!
Human Library & Gipsy Groove night in Prishtina
On Sunday, 19th of May, 19h, a famous Prishtina’s cafe bookshop – Dit’ e Nat’ – became a Human Library!
The event was organized with the frame of Regional action days against discrimination.
Human Library is a means to promote equality, which seeks to deal with prejudice and overcome the problem of discrimination.
It works the same way as an ordinary library: visitors can browse the catalog to see which titles are available; they can choose the book they want to read, and borrow it for a certain period of time. After reading the book and returning it back to the library, the reader can borrow another one, if wishes. The only difference lies in the fact that the Human Library Books are the people, so that reading consists of conversation.
Books are volunteers who have either themselves been exposed to discrimination or belong to the groups or individuals in society who are at risk to suffer from stereotyping, stigmatization, prejudice or discrimination.
Living books often have personal experience of discrimination and social exclusion and are willing to share that experience with readers. Most importantly, books give readers permission to enter into a dialogue with them, in hopes that by transferring their own views and experiences they’ll seriously call into question the common perception of stereotypes, which will significantly influence the attitudes and behaviors of wider circles of society.
The activity lasted for around 3 hours, offering to visitors various titles, such as:
‘’Being half-Albanian, half-Serbian in Kosovo”
‘’How girlish a girl needs to be’’
‘’Bar code Human Being’’
‘’I’m a Gipsy and I steal’’
…
Around 100 curious readers visited our Library and challenged own perceptions on different groups in the community.
A number of stereotypes and prejudices were questioned in a positive framework, where difficult questions were accepted, expected and appreciated.
All the books were bestsellers!
Right about the time when the last “pages‘’ were to be read, a famous Prishtina’s band Gipsy Groove took over the stage!
For more information: http://www.stopdiskriminacija.net/new/en/