Mixfaktor

Exchange and encounter of young people with and without refugee biography

In a cooperation with the Federal Agency for Civic Education (bpb), cultures interactive e.V. tested with the project mixfaktor lifeworld-youth-cultural formats for strengthening human rights attitudes, questions of identity and confrontation with ideas of (in)equality. A major focus of the project was the creation of moderated and responsibly designed opportunities for exchange and encounter between young people with and without refugee biographies. In addition, linguistic and cultural barriers were to be broken down, competencies strengthened, and youth-cultural integration opportunities built up in the community - not least in order to counteract prejudices and derogatory attitudes.

Concept

The concept took place in three regions in Thuringia, Bavaria and Lower Saxony, with five focal points per region:

1 Project days at two schools

With a lifeworld-oriented political education, our school project days were based on the interests of young people and thus enabled us to enter into an exchange with them. Different youth cultures (e.g. hip hop, techno, skateboarding, punk, emo, goth, riot grrrls, metal) were a door opener to reach a variety of young people and to negotiate topics such as democratic participation, social justice, unemployment, migration and inhuman ideologies.

2 Teaser workshops at different locations

We offered workshops in youth clubs, public places or facilities for refugees in order to engage with as many young people as possible. Three two-day workshops took place at different locations with different youth cultural and media focuses, e.g.:

  • Word and beat: creating your own texts and songs with rap and DJing
  • Image and music: With photo, film and digital music production, you can create your own show, for example for YouTube.
  • Body and kick: skateboarding (with an extra offer for girls*), breakdance or parkour

3 Empowerment training in the youth club for young refugees and multipliers

Five days of exchange on origin, identity, ideas for the future, competence building and development of youth cultural "advisors*". This included youth culture workshops such as rap, breakdance or comics as well as sessions on the topic of "home and flight", in which the young people could teach each other something. In particular, the multiplier youths were able to introduce the place and pass on important information from a youth perspective, while the refugee youths were able to pass on their own experiences and knowledge of flight. This exchange was prepared in youth-cultural and/or media form, e.g. through comics, rap or graffiti.

4 Media workshop for young people

In the five-day workshop, the participants jointly developed a film on the topic of "Happiness" and thus dealt with their own lives, their youth-cultural interests as well as friends, dreams and ideas for the future. In particular, the young people's media skills were trained. The film work included camera work, image processing, editing, digital music production, text design and speaker skills.

5 Encounter weekend

The participants from the empowerment training and the media workshop presented their results to each other on a weekend.

Project duration

Sept 2015 - April 2016 Thuringia and Bavaria
May - December 2016 Lower Saxony

In cooperation with

Logo Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung