MOSAIC - The training kit for Euro-Mediterranean youth work

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Instructions
Tell people to get up and look at the portraits in the “Exhibition of Beauties”.
Hand out the worksheets. Tell participants to write down which, in their opinion,
is the most beautiful, which the most ugly, which are men, which are women
and which country they think each person comes from. (20 minutes)
Then, when people have done that, hand out the stars and ask people to place
a red star beside the portrait they think is the most beautiful and a blue star
beside the most ugly.
When that is done, hand out the sheets of gender symbols and ask participants
to indicate whether they think the portrait is of a man or a woman.
Finally, ask people to copy their guess of the country of origin onto the labels
(using marker pens and large letters for easy reading) and stick them beside the
portraits.
When all the work is done, give people time to look at the results.
Debriefing and evaluation
In plenary, review the results of the activity and how it went. Then go on to discuss
the wider issues raised by the activity:
Was there general agreement about “Who is the most beautiful?” and “Who is
the most ugly?”?
How easy was it to guess the genders of the people in the portraits?
How easy was it to guess the countries of origin?
What criteria did people use to define beauty in the portraits?
Do you think the person whom you thought was ugly thought of themselves as
being ugly?
What is beauty? Is it more than appearances?
Are opinions about what is beauty in any way related to participants’ ages,
nationality, gender or religion?
How is our concept of beauty formed?
What clues did people use to guess a person’s gender?
Does our perception of beauty and gender influence gender equality?
How difficult or easy was it to tell the country of origin of the people in the
different pictures? What were the reasons for the difficulties?
Depending on the group and the previous discussions, you can now raise issues about
cultural differences, stereotypes and gender equality. Topics for discussion could be:
Sharing information: what is the significance of wearing a crucifix, a shawl, a
hijab, a niqab or a kippah?
Body modification: what are the limits of what is considered beautiful, acceptable
and unacceptable: for example, gold teeth, dyed hair, plucking eyebrows, tattoos,
piercing, scarification, make-up (for both men and women)?
Our appearance is an expression of our identity; but what if others find the way we
dress offensive? For example, if we have heavy tattoos, wear T-shirts with explicit
sexual images, do not wear any clothes and wish to go nude, or wear religious
symbols?
MOSAIC - The training kit for Euro-Mediterranean youth work