War or Peace Workshop
Threading a Fabric of Peace at the History Festival in Berlin
Group picture with the participants and facilitators
HSF
Discovering hidden narratives
The heading of the workshop presented at BPB’s History Festival was “Threading a Fabric of Peace”. The focus of the workshop was to interweave the dominant views about World War 1 to discover the hidden narratives, especially those from Africa. Realizing that many of today’s conflicts have their roots in WWI, the workshop resulted in commitments, represented by threads, that participants made towards weaving a Fabric of Peace. The War or Peace History Festival was a celebration marking 100 years since the end of World War One. The Festival took place at the Maxim Gorki Theatre in Berlin in Germany from the 17th – 21st of October and had around 400 young international participants aged 20-30 from various universities, civic organizations and federal or government agencies. Civics Academy together with Activate! Change Drivers presented a three-day workshop themed “History: Future” under the title “Threading a Fabric of Peace”. Using interactive methodologies that build on participants experience and knowledge, the workshop interwove dominant narratives around WWI of European soldiers and trench wars with lived experiences of war of some participants.
Bongi Ndlovu, from Activate! on the closing ceremony discussion panel
HSF
Personal pledges
A creative exercise was included, where everyone drew their ideas of what it takes to build “a fabric of peace” on a large canvas on the floor. The next day saw the “unthreading” of the dominant narratives and exploring the hidden stories of WWI. These related to how the entire world was affected by WWI, meaning that women and men from most parts in the world were involved in one way or another. We uncovered how South Africa’s dark history of apartheid was related to World War I, as just one example of human rights abuses and conflicts that have their roots in WWI, the consequences of which we are still grappling with today. This led to a discussion around understanding of peace as an absence of war or an absence of violence. It became clear that peace is not a singular thread but that it consists of multiple different narratives. Guided by Nigerian Novelist Chimamanda Adichie’s call to avoid the dangers of a singular narrative, we then used threads to symbolize our personal commitments to what each one of us can do to contribute to weave “the fabric of peace”. The Fabric of Peace thus contains personal pledges that participants can apply in their areas of influences.
Tebogo Suping along with other participants presenting the workshop outcomes at the closing ceremony
HSF
Diverse participants from Southern Africa
The Bundeszentrale für Politische Bildung (BPB), the German Federal Agency for Civic Education, had invited Civics Academy to submit a proposal for a workshop at the History Festival. The connection between Civics Academy (www.civicsacademy.co.za), a civic education initiative by the Hanns Seidel Foundation, and the BPB came through the interactions with the Networking European Citizenship Education (NECE) and the Networking Arab Civic Education (NACE) networks and the beginning of the Civic Education Network for Eastern and Southern Africa (CENESA). Civics Academy shared the call for applications to facilitate a three-day workshop at the history festival through its networks - in particular through Activate! Change Drivers and the ReImagine Group, which participants of the first, 2016, Civics Academy Youth Dialogue had created. The resulting workshop proposal designed by three workshop facilitators, namely Bongi Ndlovu, Tebogo Suping and Tebelelo Lentsoane was accepted. In addition, three further people were accepted to participate in the history festival. Civics Academy / HSF also introduced the BPB to the HSF Namibia office, whose workshop proposal was also accepted and facilitated at the festival. Civics Academy / HSF managed the process of getting all the relevant travel documents ready. For some of the team members, it was the first time to ever travel outside of South Africa, and it was with great excitement that they stepped on the plane.
Bongi Ndlovu being interviewed by German media
HSF
Renowned academics and politicians contributing to the event
The festival format was that of 20 different workshops, running simultaneously. Except for the opening and closing events, the participants chose a particular workshop, or were assigned to one of them. The opening event included a Welcome from Michelle Müntefering (Minister of State of the Federal Foreign Office) and Thomas Krüger (President of the BPB). The keynote address was delivered by Prof Achille Mbembe. The closing event consisted of a market place type presentation of all workshops in the beautiful Palais of the Maxim Gorki Theatre, where everyone got the opportunity to explore the outcomes of the other workshops and interact with the festival goers. The workshop facilitated by our team was chosen as one of the workshops that would be showcased in the closing ceremony. Facilitator Tebogo Suping along with two of our workshop participants were chosen to share their workshop experience and learning during the closing ceremony. Facilitator Bongi Ndlovu was invited to be part of a panel discussion with the State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of the Interior, Building and Community, Dr. Markus Kerber and Chairman of the Department of Modern and Contemporary History of Western Europe at the University of Freiburg. Our workshop was a huge success and was recognized by the festival coordinators, and we were requested to conduct various radio, newspaper and TV interviews. To watch the full closing ceremony, please follow this link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=43&v=Vj66kQlscAY
To find out more about the event, look up the Festival blog following this link:
https://www.warorpeace1818.org/understanding-our-history-shaping-our-future/