It is obvious that the youth are the future of a nation. The Center For Citizenship Education prepared a project aimed at helping young people understand what dialogue is and how to find otherness around oneself, accept and respect it.

The year 2008 is the European Year of Intercultural Dialogue. You are carrying out the “Shared Past – Shared Future” programme within the framework of the EYID. Could you tell us more about it?

As part of the “Shared Past – Shared Future” educational programme, which is prepared within the EYID by the Center for Citizenship Education (CCE) together with the National Centre for Culture, young people discover evidence for the co-existence of different cultures, nations, ethnic groups and religions in their region. They undertake to protect the historical buildings which are traces of the multicultural past of their home towns. They restore the memory of places, events and people who lived there at that time.

Young people look for the information about untended Jewish graveyards, ruined Evangelical tombstones, deserted synagogues or forgotten folk songs by rummaging through the archives, listening to elderly people’s stories and collecting photos. Pupils gather materials and try to understand the culture, tradition and customs of their neighbours from the past. They tell others about the multicultural past of their regions at the exhibitions, on the websites, during the presentations or trips they prepare themselves.

What does it look like in practice? Here are a few examples. The pupils from the Town School Complex no 1 in Będzin took care of the graveyard on the hill called Góra Zamkowa, which was regarded by the locals as a place to be avoided. They wondered what would be the best way to present the history of the Jewish graveyard. They decided to show the beauty of the place in the photos. They organized an exhibition. By contrast, the teenagers from the Junior Secondary School no 3 in Zgierz began their adventure with the programme by reading the book entitled “Memoir for Three Voices” by Tereska Torres. They learned about the fate of the Szwarc family. They found the story fascinating. They explored the town, following the the characters’ footsteps. They decided to find out more about their neighbours from the past. And still a different approach was taken by the pupils from a junior secondary school in Warsaw. They wanted to learn about the history and traditions of the smallest ethnic minority living in Poland – the Karaites. They’ve already contacted this community, and now they conduct interviews and collect materials.
The project is mainly aimed at the pupils of junior secondary schools and secondary schools from Poland. This is not a short, one-time event – the pupils undertake to do projects and carry them out throughout the year. The pupils’ task is not only to examine the place most thoroughly and to learn its history, but also to try and restore the memory of the people connected with that place, their culture, faith and customs.

Working on a project helps young people learn about the history of their region. It triggers discussions, reflections, and provokes to take a look at the world around us from a different perspective. It helps them to learn about their own culture and discover that our “own” culture is inextricably connected with a less known culture.

One of the participants of the project, Krzysztof Gryniuk, a primary-school pupil from ¦wier¿e, said the following: “I live next to a Jewish graveyard, and that’s how I know that Jewish people used to live in ¦wier¿e. But I was always surprised that nobody took care of the tombstones. So I used to think that this was a less important place than a Catholic graveyard. It was only at the classes, organized as part of the project, that I learned that, for the Jews, this is a more sacred place than a synagogue”. And Michał from the Secondary School Complex no 4 in Radom, after the visit to a synagogue, told his teacher in a surprised voice: “Torah is read from a completely different side!”

To help young people in their endeavours, we prepared additional events and attractions. The pupils had a chance to participate in workshops conducted by experienced instructors. During which they not only learned how to prepare a multicultural project about the past of their region, but they also practised teamwork, communication skills, formulating arguments and conducting discussions. Thanks to the cooperation with foreign partners within the Europe for Citizens Programme, the Center for Citizenship Education enabled young people to get in touch with their peers from the Czech Republic, Germany, Ukraine and Israel who were involved in similar projects in their own countries. This is an opportunity to share experience and strike up dialogue with people who have the same passion. The project will end with a conference where there will be regional presentations of the project carried out, where the pupils will show off their work, tell others about their discoveries and listen to experts’ opinions.

How important is culture in the discussions of intercultural dialogue? In your project the main focus is placed on historical buildings.

What is intercultural dialogue? We can say that it is a desirable result of an encounter with another culture. This encounter doesn’t have to be a direct one. It may take place via different cultural channels: literature, music, film and, obviously, art. In our programme such an ‘interlocutor’ are historical buildings, souvenirs and places keeping the memory of those who used to live in this country. Young people strike up dialogue with those things; they learn respect for history, culture, and another person’s customs as well as openness towards otherness. The activities that young people undertake, within our programme, with regard to multicultural traces of the past, are to prepare them for an encounter with otherness and cultural diversity existing in the contemporary world.

And how do children understand the concept of ‘intercultural dialogue’?

Of course, younger children understand intercultural dialogue in a more simplified and literal way. When we asked a group of pupils from primary schools to render the concept in drawings, they usually drew three people – one black, one slant-eyed and one white – chatting or holding hands. For children, the culture they live in is homogeneous, a concept that is still abstract. Older children associates intercultural dialogue with a need to talk about, and with, the people who are socially excluded because of their culture, religion, sexuality etc. Culture becomes for them something more individualized and diverse. They see the need for dialogue leading to actual acceptance, to openness to otherness and diversity.

In our programme we’re not going to show intercultural dialogue as a slogan with a beginning and end, instead we want to present the continuous co-existence of cultures, diversity, fluidity and boundlessness. And to prove that dialogue becomes an indispensible element of life in any environment where different cultural identities co-exist.

How great was the interest in your programme at the beginning and what is it now?

The project has participants from about 100 Polish schools. Is it a lot? The project isn’t easy and not many teachers have the courage, willingness and energy to take on additional work with the youth. The topic of our country’s multicultural past and dialogue at the local level frequently happens to be still very difficult. Working on the project, young people discover untended and forgotten places, stories left untold and painful memories. The topics like the fate of the Jews, the history of the Romani people and the fate of the Germans who used to live in Poland isn’t popular in schools. So we’re really pleased that there were teachers and pupils who had the courage to join the project and set a good example with their work.

Within the programme you are organizing a competition for junior secondary school and secondary school pupils. The goal is to prepare a project on intercultural dialogue. Please say a little more about this.

Within the programme we also announced a competition for a social advert promoting the idea of intercultural dialogue. The youth had the task to create their own original message about intercultural dialogue and to present it in an unconventional way, choosing one of the following formats: a one-minute film or radio commercial, a photo comic strip, a poster, a leaflet or a sticker. We received over 110 works from places all over Poland. We awarded 20 of them – those that surprised us with an ingenious, original slogan and with a very interesting visual form. The first place was awarded to a girl from Kędzierzyn Ko¼le for her animation entitled “Du ju łona tok ebaut?”, in which, in a synthetic form, she invites the viewer to join in a discussion beyond divisions of religion, skin colour or sexual identity. The awarded works can be viewed at http://www.ceo.org.pl/wpwpor at http://www.dialog2008.pl.
 
We still have an on-line festival before us. Does it mean that in October you are inviting us to the Internet site?

At the beginning of October we’re inviting everyone to take part in a virtual-reality festival. We’ll set up a special website where young people will be able to share their experience at forum, talk with expert in a chat room, participate in on-line games and competitions, view their comments and films. The festival is part of the European Heritage Days organized by the National Heritage Board of Poland together with the CCE. We’re preparing a lot of surprises. In the virtual space, visitors will have the possibility to meet interesting people, talk to the representatives of national and ethnic minorities living in Poland, learn everything about the historical buildings of multicultural Poland from art historians and talk to the representatives of institutions fighting for the rights of refugees.

In October it’ll be good to follow the news on the website http://www.ceo.org.pl/wpwp, and not to miss the festival day. Anyone interested in intercultural dialogue is invited!