Category: Applied ICD

Video Exhibition: Roma for Romania (Romania)

Applied ICD

Marica, Irina. (2 November 2023). Roma personalities in focus at Bucharest subway exhibition. Romania Insider.

The subway in Bucharest hosts this month a special video exhibition dedicated to outstanding personalities of the Roma culture. A total of 11 short videos about each personality are set to run on screens in subway stations until November 30.

The video exhibition aims to change mindsets, reduce stereotypes in Romanian society as a whole and contribute to the development of intercultural dialogue.

Some of the personalities included in the project are jazz singer Anca Parghel (1957-2008), violinist Ion Voicu (1923-1997), artist Anton Pann (1790-1854), footballer Bănel Nicoliță (born 1985), musician Barbu Lăutaru (1780-1858), singer Connect-R (born 1982), and actress Alina Șerban born 1987).

The exhibition is part of the “Roma for Romania” campaign, which the National Agency for Roma, the National Center for Roma Culture – Romano Kher and the “Pro-Europa” Roma Party Association have been running since April 2023.

WOSM/KAICIID: Dialogue for Peace

Applied ICD

The International Dialogue Centre – KAICIID and the World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM) have signed a new memorandum of understanding to continue the Dialogue for Peace programme.

Through the Dialogue for Peace programme, KAICIID and WOSM have increased the number of dialogue facilitators and trainers within the Scouting movement, helping Scouts acquire the skills to promote a culture of peace and create positive change in their communities. Since 2013, they have jointly trained over 1,000 people from 120 countries. The renewed partnership will seek to build on and expand the existing successes of the Dialogue for Peace initiative and other awareness activations around dialogue. The Dialogue for Peace Challenge Badge is an initiative co-designed by WOSM and KAICIID to develop competencies related to dialogue in young people to promote active listening, non-judgemental communications, and ultimately build a culture of peace.

Mojuba! Dance Collective & ICD (USA)

Applied ICD

McKeown, Nora. (14 August 2023). Mojuba! Dance Collective creates space for dancing and healing. Spectrum News.

This is not just something for me or for us, or the people who are in the company, but this can really be a move of the community to help us to have that intercultural dialogue, to help us to find ways to tell our own stories.

-Errin Weaver

“In 2019, Errin Weaver started Mojuba! Dance Collective for choreographers in Cleveland to explore the African Diaspora through movement and healing . . . The collective has been well-received by the community, prompting intercultural conversations. It also provides a space for Black choreographers to feel validated in their experiences and heal through dance.”

Interreligious Dialogue: Heschel Center at Catholic U of Lublin (Poland)

Applied ICD

The Heschel Center has begun its activities at the Catholic University of Lublin.

The Abraham J. Heschel Center for Catholic-Jewish Relations – a new scientific, educational, and cultural unit to deepen Catholic-Jewish relations internationally – has began its activities at the Catholic University of Lublin, Poland. Scientific research, publishing activities, student exchanges, as well as international symposia, conferences, debates and cultural events are the main tasks of the institution. Its mission is to build Catholic-Jewish relations on the scientific, educational, and cultural levels on an international scale. The center combines research work, commemorating the past, educating and engaging young people, as well as shaping public awareness through modern media on a global scale.

The pillars on which the Center’s activities are based can be summed up in a motto: Common Bible – Common Past – Common Future. They also relate to shared biblical roots, to the community of the history of both societies, as well as to the need to shape a future based on dialogue and openness to multiculturalism – said the Rector of the Catholic University of Lublin, Rev. Prof. Miroslaw Kalinowski.

Creative Intercultural Collaboration in the UK Modern Foreign Languages Classroom (UK)

Intercultural Dialogue Pedagogy

McAllister, A., Brandford, V., & Smith, C. (Eds.). (2023). Creative intercultural collaboration in the UK modern foreign languages classroom: The quest for social justice. Journal of Education, Innovation and Communication, 5(1).

This is a special issue of the Journal of Education, Innovation and Communication, featuring “a series of articles which outline approaches to teaching and learning Languages foregrounding collaboration, and in which creativity is fostered and culture is drawn upon.” It’s open access. In addition to the preface, linked above, the articles are:

The language of literacy: Developing student independence and confidence in the MFL classroom through a collaborative approach to literacyby Amy Cragg

Engaging with others to identify areas of learning by Nicholas Mark Page

Improving writing skills with Year 10 French students by Juliette O’Connor

Promoting self-esteem, motivation and creativity through collaborative, pluri-lingual story translations by Amy Flynn

Raising learner motivation through a cultural pen-pal scheme: a collaborative study by Dikshali Shah

Multicultural Music: Cultural Connections Over Time

Applied ICD

Williger, Jonathan. (23 May 2023). From Pomona to Heart Mountain: “La Banda Más Chingón en Wyoming.” Folklife Magazine.

“The cultural and geographic lineage of “La Banda Más Chingón en Wyoming” by No-No Boy with Mariachi Los Broncos is culturally layered and deeply American: a mariachi rendition of a folk-country song about a 1940s Japanese American swing band, composed in Wyoming by the son of a Vietnamese refugee from Nashville performed in Southern California. Brimming with ecstatic energy and righteous anger, the song draws connections between recent waves of migration from Central and South America and the long history of Asian American immigration and the discrimination both groups have experienced once they reached American soil.”

This recording is a great example of combining multiple cultural heritages through music. The article explicitly discusses the parallels between current Latin American migrants to the US, and Japanese Americans during World War II.

Open Call for DEMO (Democracy, Elections, Mentorship, Organizing)

Applied ICD

Open Call for D.E.M.O. – Democracy, Elections, Mentorship, Organizing Programme, European Alternatives, France / Germany / Italy. Deadline: 30 June 2023.

The “D.E.M.O.” programme aims at encouraging and facilitating the active engagement of a wide network of European citizens through both training & hands-on action, in the context of the upcoming 2024 European Elections. They have just launched the open call to identify and select 50 change-makers from at least 8 countries (Austria, Bulgaria, Czechia, Greece, Slovakia, Slovenia, Romania, Sweden and others) to participate in the D.E.M.O. programme. Those selected change-makers will receive the necessary tools to re-imagine democracy in their local communities and to encourage democratic participation.

The project will achieve this through a series of eight training sessions: 2 residential and 6 online, accompanied by additional informal skill-sharing sessions, peer-to-peer exchange, mentorship sessions, etc. After the training process, the participants will be encouraged to implement two activities in their local communities that engage other people, based on the skills acquired through the content of the training sessions.

Some of these activities may be participatory art creations, podcasts, videocasts, workshops, lectures, etc. In addition, the project will be presented as part of the programME of significant events around Europe in 2023-2024. “D.E.M.O.” will specifically engage people who often feel underrepresented in their locality and whose voice remains unheard when it is time for political and social decisions, such as women, people of colour, migrants, representatives of the LGBTQI+ community, etc.

The open call is for 50 change-makers with no specific age requirement; who are citizens or residents of the following countries (but not limited to): Austria, Bulgaria, Czechia, Greece, Slovakia, Slovenia, Romania, Sweden; and people who want to expand their skills in: community organizing, facilitation, political gatherings, political artistic creation, podcast production, video production.

CERC: Under the Tent (Canada)

Intercultural Dialogue Pedagogy
Under the Tent. Canada Excellence Research Chair (CERC) in Migration and Integration, Toronto Metropolitan University, Toronto, Canada.

“Under the Tent is a multimedia storytelling project that explores how individuals experience a sense of belonging or not belonging under the tent of Canadian multiculturalism…The project began in the fall of 2021 with a call to graduate students from across Canada to collaborate with CERC Migration to produce a creative work that investigated multiculturalism…Through a competitive process, a select group of graduate students were invited to receive training support and mentorship to explore their personal experiences with race and diversity in the production of a creative work using a medium of their choice. They were asked to express criticisms and also new thinking on the future possibilities of multiculturalism.”

What is now available online are 17 of the stories presented as short films, sometimes supplemented by photographs and interviews, describing ways in which each of the authors falls “under the tent” of multiculturalism in Canada. These are divided into 3 acts: Act 1: Negotiating barriers, overcoming differences; Act 2: Connections to the past, the journey ahead; and Act 3: Importance of refuge, reconciliation and empowerment. This would be a useful collection to begin a class discussion, and might well serve as inspiration for a class project.

COE: Spaces of Inclusion (EU)

Applied ICD

Community Media Institute. (2018). Spaces of Inclusion – An explorative study on needs of refugees and migrants in the domain of media communication and on responses by community media. Council of Europe.

This report documents an effort to discover the potential of local initiatives, specifically of community media, in responding to the arrival of increasing numbers of migrants and refugees in the EU. One of the goals of the project was “to promote the media’s contribution to intercultural dialogue” (p. 8).

The main research question posed was:

What role do media in general and community media in particular play for (recently arrived) refugees and migrants in response to their particular needs and with regard to their human right to freedom of expression, which includes the right to information?

The majority of participants in the study were those with recent experiences of displacement living in Austria, coming from diverse geographical, social, and professional backgrounds, and the primary research method chosen was ethnographic interviewing. Researchers learned that establishing community media could help in multiple ways, specifically by:

  • bridging language barriers
  • providing a less constrained space for alternative narratives and self-representations as well as for socially recognised positions for refugees and migrants from where they can speak their own voice
  • giving access to knowledge, in particular for coping with the new environment
  • establishing and integrating networks, and
  • accommodating the needs of (language) learners (p. 25).

“Community media appear mostly in form of community radio. The participatory approach to content production leads to the fact that they manage to include marginalised groups and contribute to community development, social inclusion and intercultural dialogue.” (p. 46)

Using Radio for ICD: Common Voices Radio (Germany)

Applied ICD

Common Voices Radio: multilingual Radio for Halle and surroundings, Halle, Germany.

“Common Voices Radio is a radio show made by refugees and migrants in Halle and surroundings. We’ll pick up questions, issues and problems which are relevant for refugees and discuss them on air. Together we want to use the radio as a bridge in order to create a more sympathetic community…Who’s going to support me in case I don’t understand the latest letter from Ausländerbehörde (foreigners‘ registration office)? Where can I find a language course without charge? What do I bring along if I’m invited to a birthday party by German friends? Send us your questions and we’ll answer them on the radio. common-voices@radiocorax.de or find us on Facebook!”

Common Voices Radio was highlighted as an example of good practices by the Council of Europe’s Spaces of Inclusion report.