In this global Covid-19 pandemic, Learning Life is pleased to announce the release of four new and innovative video silent stories to spur conversation on international health issues. The videos, each linked below, were made with a cast of actors and producers from four countries worldwide, and are a project of Learning Life’s Family Diplomacy Initiative (FDI).
In line with Learning Life’s mission to spread learning and innovate education beyond school walls, FDI connects families worldwide to share and learn together via our FDI Facebook group. This year, from April to October, 40+ selected families in 20+ countries across the globe are participating in a food culture project through which they are sharing photos and text explanations in answer to six family and country food culture questions (e.g., what does breakfast look like in your family? What is a food trend in your country?). Learning Life also posts content of interest to families worldwide including profiles of FDI families, We Are Family Diplomats posters, interesting perspectives on family life worldwide, and free and low-cost, online, multi-lingual resources for individuals and families.
In addition, starting last year, Learning Life staff and volunteers began developing video silent short stories to creatively and collaboratively engage our youth and families in learning about international issues. The stories are silent for two reasons: to stimulate viewer conversation about the stories’ meanings, and to allow anyone worldwide, regardless of their spoken language(s), to understand the stories. In the fall of 2019, Learning Life produced its first four video silent stories on issues of poverty, labor and consumption, gender inequality, and school work. These stories featured Learning Life Mentoring Program youth and adult volunteers in the metro Washington, DC, USA as the on-screen actors.
Those stories followed on an original pilot live Global Storytelling Challenge led by Learning Life staff and featuring 7th and 8th grade students at Saint Thomas More Catholic Academy (STM) in Washington DC in fall 2018. The students created and performed their own plays about child labor and human trafficking before an audience of fellow STM students and Learning Life volunteer storytelling judges.
This summer, we took an ambitious step forward in the storytelling project by producing four new videos engaging FDI families and youth in four countries across the world: Australia, India, El Salvador and the USA. While the 2019 stories were recorded in-person in metro DC, the 2020 stories were recorded online via Zoom, commonly involving actors, camera persons and directors in two countries at the same time. Consonant with the Covid-19 pandemic, the 2020 videos focus on widespread international health issues, including communicable diseases like Covid as well as diabetes, heart disease, and water scarcity and pollution. A report on the 2020 project’s impact on the health knowledge of the participating child actors is forthcoming later this year.
In 2021 and beyond, Learning Life plans to produce more video stories like these, and collect them in a growing library of silent stories on international issues on Youtube to spur conversation and learning in families, groups and classrooms across the globe. The long-term vision is to develop an international silent storytelling competition that engages youth and families worldwide in making their own silent stories, or stories in collaboration with youth or families in other countries. To learn more, or get involved in future Learning Life silent stories, please contact us at email@learninglife.info.
Learning Life wishes to thank the following volunteers for helping to bring the four 2020 silent stories to fruition:
Video and story production staff: Gina Dario Stringer, Debjani Bhattacharya Das, Trinabrata Das, Ella Fasciano (special thanks to Ella as video editor for the 2020 stories!), Angeline Fry, Emily Krisanda, Paul Lachelier, Allison Miller, and Kelly Pemberton.
Health education staff for the 2020 stories: Angeline Fry and Emily Krisanda. We also wish to thank the Georgetown University School of Medicine (GUSM), and the Director of GUSM’s Community Health Division, Dr. Kim Bullock, for their support of the 2020 silent story project.
Story actors: Diego Constanza, Leo Dario Stringer, Triggya & Trinabh Das, Lily Fasciano, and Kieran Lamb.
Citizen Diplomacy International Meeting #2
About Citizen Diplomacy International
Due to globalization, the internet, rising education levels, and long-term democratization, citizen diplomacy is growing, and becoming a more important part of diplomacy and international affairs. Thus, in 2020, the Public Diplomacy Council of America (PDCA), a US-based NGO devoted to advancing the field of public diplomacy, formed the Citizen Diplomacy Research Group (CDRG) to advance the research and practice of citizen diplomacy. In 2023, the CDRG became Citizen Diplomacy International (CDI), a network and program of Learning Life, a Washington DC-based nonprofit devoted to developing innovative learning communities in order to widen and deepen participation in democracy and diplomacy.
CDI meets every three months online via Zoom for 1.5 hours to share research and news on citizen diplomacy developments worldwide with an eye to building a vibrant global CD sector for a more participatory, equitable and sustainable world.. Meetings typically begin with two presentations on CD research or practice, followed by discussion of the presentations, then news and announcements of past or upcoming international CD-related initiatives, publications, funding, conferences, etc.
Anyone — including scholars, students, citizen diplomacy practitioners, current and retired official diplomats, and others interested — can join CDI to learn, network, and/or present substantial research or practice in citizen diplomacy. For more information or to join the CDI email list, contact email@learninglife.info. You can also connect with CDI members via our Facebook group and Linkedin group, to which you can post citizen diplomacy-related articles, books, events, funding, etc.
A) Robert Kelley, Assistant Professor, School of International Service, American University: Citizen diplomacy definitions, landscape, and trends (12 minutes)
B) Hayley Pottle, TechGirls Program Coordinator, Legacy International:
TechGirls: brief history, purpose, program, and benefits (12 minutes) C) Questions and discussion about the presentations (20 minutes) 3) Announcements (25 minutes, 1 minute per person)
4) Future meeting presentations (10 minutes)
This final part of the meeting is to help identify who would like to present on what citizen diplomacy topics (i.e., cross-national citizen-to-citizen programs, projects, trends, issues, etc.) at upcoming meetings.
Introducing the “We Are Family Diplomats” Poster Series
Learning Life is pleased to announce the launch of our “We Are Family Diplomats” poster series. Each poster in the series features a different family, and is intended to encourage people worldwide to join Learning Life’s Family Diplomacy Initiative on Facebook.
Learning Life established the Family Diplomacy Initiative (FDI) in 2016 to advance a family form of citizen diplomacy given families are (a) widely valued across cultures, (b) deeply impacted by world events, from climate change to immigration to disease transmission, yet (c) have little voice, as families, in international affairs. (Click here for five reasons why families should be involved in diplomacy.) FDI began in summer 2016 with test live internet dialogues between lower-income families in Washington DC, Dakar, Senegal, and Porto de la Libertad, El Salvador. From 2017 to 2019, we completed a community photo project then a food culture and nutrition project, each engaging ten lower-income families in the USA, El Salvador, Senegal and Jordan. In so doing, FDI leveraged the internet to engage families that don’t have the luxury to travel abroad in world learning. Since summer 2019, we have more than tripled the number of families connected to our FDI Facebook Group as we enter into a new, scaled-up phase of the Family Diplomacy Initiative.
The “We Are Family Diplomats” poster series helps publicize FDI, and encourages families around the world to join and participate. Each poster features a family’s photo, plus their completion of the sentence: “We are family diplomats because…” Over the next seven weeks, we will share the first seven posters to FDI on Facebook, and via Learning Life’s social media pages on Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter. Highlighted here is the Pandeya Family’s poster.
Any families that wish to be highlighted on a future poster should email us (1) their country of residence, (2) a clear, high-resolution photo of their family, and (3) their brief completion of the sentence “We are family diplomats because…” to email@learninglife.info.
Thanks to Learning Life intern Allison Miller for her assistance in the design of the “We Are Family Diplomats” posters.
Interview: Civics Factor Interviews Learning Life Founder
Click here for the Youtube video interview Civics Factor conducted with Learning Life founder, Paul Lachelier, on July 6, 2020. The interview discusses Learning Life’s three programs — Family Diplomacy Initiative, International Mentoring Program, and Democracy Dinners — and Paul’s thoughts on democracy and citizen engagement. Civics Factor is a podcast interview series produced by Canada-based civic education advocate, Mark McInnes. Learn more at civicsfactor.com.
