turkish-greek civic dialogue - AEGEE Europe

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Second exercise was a journey on the
train. The participants split up into 4
groups this time all of them assumed
different roles such as a mother, punk,
Bosnian immigrant, Croatian, lesbian.
The groups were at the train platform
and the conductor was telling them
that there were no seats available
on the train for all of them so they
needed to decide among themselves
one person who would get on the
train to travel. After this exercise,
the participants were provided with
limited time to discuss over the issue,
they later on presented their decisions
and discussions to the whole group.
The participants worked on drawing
the portraits of the “friend” and the
“enemy”. The first group brainstormed
on the concept of the friend and the
second group brainstormed on the
concept of the enemy. At the end,
both groups were combined and
discussed together on the drawings of
friend and enemy portraits.
The next exercise was sculpturebuilding;
participants built improvised
sculptures inspired by some
connotations. They discussed about
the outcomes of the stereotypes
came out of the ROAD MAP activity
and they identified the stereotypes
accompanied with their portrait of
enemy.
At the end of the workshop,
participants worked on developing
the concept of the sculpture they would build to present to the plenary as
the outcome of the workshop. This presentation of sculpture should have
presented the problems discussed, stereotypes and their alternative solutions.
To this end, participants identified some factors that are creating problems in
Turkish-Greek relations and they made analysis of movement. The presentation
fascinated all Final Conference participants.
THEATRE OF THE
OPPRESSED WORKSHOP
by Neslihan Özgüneş
The Theatre of the Oppressed (TO) is the ensemble of techniques and approaches
to theatre pioneered by the Brazilian theatre practitioner Augusto Boal. The
common element of the various branches of this work is that all seek to make
the power of theatre as a force for change available to everyone, particularly
those in oppressed situations.
One of the goals of our workshop was to work with assumptions and stereotypes
and issues of conflict. Through the exercises and participation of the youth,
we were able to touch on action and reaction to conflict, group dynamics, and
expressing oneself in physical form. There seemed to be a reticence in terms
of approaching controversial, conflicting issues, and an unwillingness to dive
deeper into sensitive topics partly due to the lack of time.
We were able to set up two Invisible theatre sketches that were played out
in the final session in the amphitheatre. The first sketch, with some (Turkishin
parenthesis because this only became relevant later) youth protesting two
(Greek) ‘lesbians’ created a great deal of reaction. Four or five of the AEGEE
staff reacted in panic (not knowing of course that this was just theatre) and
began to shout at the girls and boy complaining about the ‘lesbians’.
While the intention of the exercise was to create a discussion about
homosexuality and perspectives on homosexuality in our societies, the violent
reaction of the staff (shouting at the youth “who do you think you are?” “Go
Final Conference Association des Etats Généraux des Etudiants de L’Europe