Cultural Agora@Your Library

Project facts

Project promoter:
The National Association of Librarians and Public Libraries in Romania
Project Number:
RO13-0030
Target groups
Young adults,
Civil servants/Public administration staff
Status:
Completed
Initial project cost:
€202,644
Final project cost:
€196,766
From EEA Grants:
€ 150,526
The project is carried out in:
Romania

Description

The PP proposed project fits perfectly within the scope of concerns about supporting projects that promote access to culture, awareness of cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue through innovative and creative approaches to public service in the field of culture and education.The project uses digital storytelling to reflect history and culture, and community beliefs and values. Digital storytelling involves multiple disciplines, including literary and artistic skills, legal issues and information technology, giving libraries an opportunity to promote the knowledge surrounding these topics. Any library can be used as a community space and can potentially facilitate the exchange of community knowledge using digital story which is designed following a creative process. The project is expected to prove that digital communication has the potential to revolutionize the sharing of knowledge, ideas, and culture. Moreover, the project promotes community engagement in digital storytelling that stimulates sharing the “universal” human experience to reveal the power of the individual voice to influence positive change. The proposed locations: Bucharest, Sibiu, Cluj, Braila, Oslo. This project intends to provide librarians an opportunity to learn how to become a facilitator for the creation of materials that come from users, involving ordinary people coming into the library allowing them to add their own stories, video, text, photographs. All lessons learned and products developed during the project will be disseminated in the partners’ countries: Romania and Norway. Jazzmontør - a Norwegian Oslo-based company specialized in digital storytelling and projects evolving around people, places, history, culture, heritage, reflections and understanding - is partner in this project. Jazzmontør will be involved in transferring know – how and state of the art information on digital storytelling to PP members and other Romanian partners, by using interactive workshops.

Summary of project results

The project idea appeared from the Romanian society need to find landmarks and cultural authentic values in the detriment of real anti-patterns promoted by the media. By accessing Cultural Agora, the participants had the opportunity to produce and share their own stories, videos, texts, photos and voice, their values and beliefs of their own ethnic group, using the Digital Storytelling technique. In terms of nature and scope of activities, in the context of Cultural Agora project were generated over than 1,500 stories digital from more than 190 stories about Roma culture, with the participation of over than 1,500 participants, including more than 500 ethnic participants, from which 230 Roma participants and over than 170 librarians. The Cultural Agora project supported 4 libraries in Bucharest, Cluj, Sibiu and Braila to become community centers for digital stories. The project also supported the participation of members of various local ethnic communities (Hungarians, Germans, Turks, Tartars, Hebrew, Roma etc.). The Cultural Agora project introduced in Romanian public libraries a set of tools and techniques based on modern technology, through which users of library services, belonging to different ethnic communities, have become creators of original digital stories on relevant cultural themes The main deliverables produced were development of Digital Storytelling courses for librarian-trainers and for the community developed and delivered, developing a methodology of training of trainers in the use of digital storytelling techniques for librarians and local communities, organizing 4 days of DST regional workshop in 4 locations: Bucharest, Cluj, Sibiu and Braila, launch of 4 DST regional centers (one in each county involved), the English translation of a number of digital stories in order to disseminate them, the development and application of feedback questionnaires for participants, creation of a collection dedicated to the Roma culture which was stored in public libraries in the 4 locations mentioned above. The main change occurred at the level of perception. Thanks to the Cultural Agora project , several disadvantaged audiences in terms of social, geographical or ethnic affiliation to a group or another, have had access to technology, modern equipment, training and quality networking.

Summary of bilateral results

The project established a long term partnership between ANBPR - Jazzmontor AS Norway - REPLIKA Cultural Association in Romania. The collaboration within Cultural Agora project meant a permanent experience and know-how exchange between these organizations and has contributed significantly to increasing the professionalism level and extending the range of expertise of each of the involved parties. The training sessions methodology was based on the expertise of Jazzmontor AS Norway, who transferred the know-how of its partners in Romania. He made a plan to follow by the librarians, very detailed and centered on structure and time observance. As far as the partnership between Jazzmontor AS Norway and the REPLIKA Cultural Association (Romanian Partner) is concerned, it involved collaboration for the performance IN YOUR WORDS, based on the collection of digital stories made by the participants. The Norwegian expert participated in the theater play representation of the project closure event and was involved in the dissemination of the results and the final monitoring of the activities.