Some historical background

(historia de los derechos humanos)

The concept of human rights evolved very recently in history. It derives from the 18th century term the „Rights Of Man“, even though the idea of having a legislation to define and protect one's rights is much older.

Throughout history the concept of human rights has gone through several stages. Its inception took place on August 26th in 1789 when France's constitutional assembly unanimously voted for a set of essential rights to be conferred to the citizen.

The „Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen“, that consisted of seventeen articles, came into being. It constituted a highly important and necessary change in human history, but the Declaration did not yet, among other things, include equal rights for women.   

Nevertheless, the declaration made headway in establishing several due rights for citizens such as political and social equality, the right of property, the right to freedom of speech and press, etc. Those can be seen as the first generation of human rights, which covers basic individual rights and thus conditions a weakening of absolutism in politics and the     monarchy.

The second stage of human rights developed as a consequence to new ideologies and social structures like communism and the industrial revolution. New values had then become essential in the life of the human being as well as economic and cultural status had increased. The individual at that time needed to develop as part of a society, which meant that groups as such needed to be assigned rights as well.

Back then several very important steps were taken to accomplish the aim of developing human rights. The 'Universal Declaration of Human Rights', that the UN passed on December 10th 1948, was surely the most important step to progress. Still, the 'Declaration of the Rights of the Child' (1959) as well as the 'Convention on the Political Rights of Women' (1954), the 'Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women' (1979) or the 'Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment' (1984)  were of great importance to bring forth the progress of Human Rights.

Lately the human being is confronted increasingly with new challenges to which it has to find an answer. A third generation of human rights, which is now to involve the right of environmental protection, economical development of all people, the right of peace, etc. is needed to solve these problems.

The needs of society grow and a higher standard of living is being demanded. The effect on Human Rights is that they cannot only apply to the occidental white man any more, but they now have to include women, children and all kinds of cultures. Aside from that they have to apply to the environment and the peace progress as these are necessary means to guarantee an equally high standard of living for all people.

AINDESOS places its work in the field of the third generation of Human Rights and tries to introduce and include the Rights of Women, Children, the protection of the environment and sustainability in people's everyday life.


The aims of AINDESOS

(to be found in our organisation's constitution)

(nuestros fines)

Art. 6º.- Aims:


1) The general aim of AINDESOS is representing the concerns of all of its members. This applies to every member. No exception will be made due to ethnicity, colour of skin, gender, religion, political views, or any other circumstance.

2) To create a link between all the different cultures, ethnic groups and religions with a view to making the exposition, the dissemination and the exchange of opinions and experiences in terms of cultural, educational, artistic and other topics easier. This is to provide a platform for members and visitors in order to create in a sustainable way a peaceful, tolerant, and democratic environment.

3) To dedicate ourselves to support the processes of integration.

4) To represent our members concerns and to promote all people's rights.

5) To offer mediation as a means to peacefully resolve conflicts.

6) To investigate, publish and spread information about topics related to

interculturality.

7) To facilitate activities, that reveal important values and ways of behaving in order to support the intercultural society politically, economically and culturally.

8) To forge relationships with other organizations or associations to be able to cooperate with them on a national or international basis in terms of integrationand mediation.

9) To peacefully live in intercultural coexistence.

10) To intervene in situations in which intercultural mediation is the ideal means toresolve conflicts.

11) To prevent the arising or development of conflicts in intercultural coexistence. Should we know about activities or practices which provoke conflicts, to reportto the police about the offender.

12) To promote sustainable behaviour in terms of protecting the environment.

13) To bring forward integration and social as well as cultural support forimmigrants and refugees, to help them develop personally in their new socialenvironment and help them to get their autonomy back.

14)To offer a platform for information and orientation, as well as family mediationfor all immigrants and refugees, that we make contact with.

  15) To help build a consciousness in society about a future, which will constitute interculturality. Hence to promote educational models for establishing intercultural competences in society. In order to accomplish mutual tolerance and solidarity, to promote mutual respect of all cultures through support ofexchange and dialogue and hereby to develop a democratic intercultural societybased on equality.

16) To support intercultural relations and help integration starting from educationall people coherently.

17) To help abolish ghettos, which impede the social development of every memberof marginalized ethnic minorities.

18) To motivate the participation of adolescents and adults in our organisation's workshops.

19) To collaborate with other entities and organisations that are dedicated to work against the marginalization of ethnic minorities, xenophobia or racism and which, on the other hand, work for functional integration and diversity in all cultures.

20) To promote sports as a way to bring forth integration, considering thatcooperating to accomplish a mutual goal can be a strong means of cohesion inintercultural groups.

21) To support global development.

22) To organize reunions and conferences as a platform for information, education, discussions and debates referring to topics related to interculturality, education, culture, etc..

23) To report to officials about the demands of our associations members and to request as well as help with taking up measures to resolve social, cultural,artistic, educational, environmental and occupational problems in society.

 

For the accomplishment of our aims the following activities will be carried out:

(para cumplirlos los siguientes actividades)

 
1.- Conferences about functional coexistence and other kinds of necessary activities to achieve the above-mentioned aims. Collaboration with other universal, European, national, autonomic, provincial and local institutions that seem suitable to do so.

2.- Workshops for work orientation as well as qualification and programmes to work against and prevent literacy defects next to cultural programmes.

3.- Project development with a view to abolishing addiction issues by pointing out and discussing necessary habits to live a healthy life.

4.- Workshops that guarantee the full integration of students with migrational background into everyday school life.

5. - Sportive activities in schools with intercultural teams.

  6. - Projects to create a consciousness for interculturality.

  7. - Projects to create a consciousness for the environment.

8. - Projects about international cooperation, co-education, integration and non-attendance to school.


There are the following fields of intervention:

(areas de intervención)

- women
- children and adolescents
- health
- education and work orientation
- habitat
- education
- environment
- immigration

 

Race (a classification of human beings)


The term race is used to divide one species into several groups with similar, hereditary characteristics. It is usually used with respect to animals, whereas in the case of the human being, it is strongly discussed if „races“ exist at all.

The concept of classifying people to form races came up in Europe in the 16th century. It was used until the 20th century as a tool for racism and for the European imperialism of that epoch. The classification was made due to certain and obvious biological characteristics, most of the times skin colour and certain facial features.

The concept of racism was abandoned after the Second World War. Already then certain scientists claimed that humankind had never had the possibility to actually form races as such, because it had mixed to much due to its sense of mobility and sociability.

Nowadays putting the concept of race in relation to human beings provokes strong polemics and those who find that it cannot be used that way say that genetic differences between people are too minor to justify the concept of race. This critical perspective on the term has created an inevitable link from a person who uses it to „racist“.

Since the 1940 scientists have been rejecting the concept of race as it demands a certain number of essential characteristics to even be able to distinguish different races. Further, they state that applying the concept of races to humankind would lack taxonomic significance and precision, because “race” varies according to the people's culture.

   As a reaction to biological predetermination, afterwards leading to segregation and racial discrimination, scientists as well as anthropologists stated in 1960 that humankind constitutes only one race which is divisible into different ethnic groups . Herein, the investigative work of the anthropologist Franz Boa and later on that of Claude Lévi-Strauss were very important for the upcoming of these ethnocentric tendencies related to culture.

At the end of the 1950s, then, UNESCO recommended the substitution of the word „race“ by „ethnic group“, because „race“ resulted confusing, imprecise and not scientifically adequate.

Anthropology today found a better way of distinguishing between biological, ethnic and cultural characteristics.

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Project to prevent discrimination in school life.

 

(Prevención de conductas discriminatorias en el entorno educativo)

 

We offer workshops to help students in dealing with intercultural conflicts.


Name of the project:

Prevention of discriminatory behaviour in schools

Area of intervention:

classes 8-12 in schools in the province of Granada

Aim:

Serve as a bridge between schoolkids of different cultures ethnic groups and religions. To help change perspectives between them.

Purpose of the workshop:

to prevent discrimination in schools

contents:

mutual tolerance of the different ethnic groups
equality of sex
solidarity among the pupils
sensibilisation for cultural and personal values

structure of the workshop:

organisation and questioning – 10 minutes
two-phase progress – 45 minutes

a) phase one: debate or
case study: the presentation of a certain situation

from the pupils point of view
b) phase two: group tasks including the presentation of a problem

solution of the problem – 25 Minuten
conclusion

procedure:

• estimation of and cooperation with the individual climate in each class
  - to show up peaceful ways of mutual behaviour towards each other, which are based on case studies
  - point out general approaches to resolving conflicts

  
  

  
  

  
  Two educators as well as the needed material will be supplied by the organisation.
  The workshop should be organized either in the assembly hall or in the schoolyard.
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Also, apart from the „Project to Prevent Discriminatory Behaviour in Schools“, AINDESOS offers eight different types of workhops.
The workshop fitting the students' ages most can be decided on together with the school.
 

 

 

 

Workshops:

1)Presenting AINDESOS -
What is our work and what are the goals?

2)Discrimination, Racism and Human Rights

 

3)The correct approach to conflicts – reflecting mutual behaviour

 

4)Xenophobia - a documentation

 

5)Empathy and social abilities

 

6)The effects of the consumption of tobacco and alcohol on school performance

 

7)The environment – problems and the respective approaches

 

8)Gender discrimination


With the help of educational dynamics, discussion rounds and information, our workshops are aimed at creating a better understanding of Human Rights, equality, interculturality and environmental problems. Mutual acceptance and kindness are important factors to strengthen the students self-confidence and create a bigger basis for tolerance of other people, opinions and eventually cultures.

The educational dynamics are adapted to each class. From class six to eight we focus on selfesteem as it is the basis for trusting others. The students are to learn to express their thoughts and feelings effectively and thus to obtain a firm basis for tolerance. Insecurity is one of the most important causes for discrimination and so we try to strengthen the students self confidence and their competences in terms of communcation to prevent discrimination.

From class nine to twelve we correlate the respective subjects to nowadays problems and attempt to achieve a reflection of all students' individual behaviour. We try to find out where misunderstandings, frustration and discrimination originate. The aim is to discuss, compare and reflect the values of each student once more.

AINDESOS wants to support the students in living in accordance with their personal values and lead a peaceful life in a community, which is getting more and more influenced by interculturality.



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Project to prevent discrimination in schools

 

(Proyecto: prevención de conductas discriminatorias en el entorno educativo.)

 

Content:

1. INTRODUCTION

2. GROUNDS

3. AIMS

4. GENERAL AIMS

5. FURTHER AIMS

6. APPROACH

7. IN SUMMARY

 

1. INTRODUCTION:

The aim of AINDESOS is to work on a way for society to live peacefully in an intercultural environment. In all of its time being, society has constantly mixed up and thus all cultures have been influencing each other. Hence, interculturality became an important factor in peoples lives. From our point of view it can highly enrich everyone in terms of culture, but also in political views.

Interculturality, assimilation andmulticulturalismare the three key terms to further explain our project.

 

Interculturality, as a term,refers to any aspect of a respectful interaction between cultures in the same country or area.ⁱIts condition affects the respective in terms of language, politics and their style of life. For scientists interculturality is highly interesting as it can help resolving existing problems between cultures as well as to fight the discrimination of minorities in a country. In 'Science of Education' it thus has become an important grounds for the necessity of “global education”.

 

According to UNESCO (1982) “culture” is what gives people the ability of being a critical, rational and reflected human being.ⁱⁱIt is hereby the basis for finding ones personal identity in the context of society through associating with a certain group.

 

Multiculturalism is the belief and practice of giving equal importance to each of the different cultures in a society. It also constitutes cooperation on a political level with equal rights without aspiring any kind of influence on each other.

 

Assimilationis the process of one people becoming part of a community or culture by adapting certain features of it. It is mostly a minority and usually loses some or even all of their own cultural characteristics as for example the language or dialect.

 

AINDESOS wants to mediate between cultures and create a better understanding for each other. In that respect, we work together with different schools and organise educational workshops.

 

There are different ways for Intercultural mediation. The first one is mediation between two poeple from the same background. With the second one, prevention, one usually tries to impede possible or probable conflicts by means of educating about relevant topics. The third possibility is to reflect past conflicts that came up due to prejudice, discrimination or misunderstandings and thus also prevent future conflict.

 

 

 

2. GROUNDS

 

Due to migration, our society is becoming more and more diverse and AINDESOS wants to contribute to the protection of equal rights for every person.

Our Projects to create a consciousness for interculturality and related problems are therefore an important step in that direction.

 

We decided to carry out a survey in the schools we work with to shows the need for our work. 2178 students took part in the survey.

The result is the following:

 

Do you think there are races which are superior to others?

Yes: 11%. No: 89%.

According to the 11% marking yes “our culture is superior to others”. To us it showed that probably a part of the students does not distinguish between the terms 'culture' and 'race'.

 

Would you prefer that foreigners stay in their home country?

Yes: 43%. No: 57%.

According to those who marked Yes foreigners “take all our work” and “steal from us” and that “the country is already crowded” . Further, “we should help our fellow men and women instead of foreigners”. Those marking no said that migration is just a way of “taking advantage of personal freedom” and that “everybody is free to do whatever he or she wants”.ⁱⁱⁱ

 

Do you think immigrants should have to adapt to our culture?^iv

Yes: 83%. No: 17%.

 

 

 

Which ones of the following statements do you agree with?

.

.- Students who come from a background to do with migration lower the class level: 85%

(It seems the surveyed students put language competence on one level with intelligence.)

.- Do you feel Spain is experiencing a very high level of immigration: 72%

(The students do not take into consideration that before it was the spanish people who had to emigrate to be able to make a living.)

.- Arabic cultures are the cause of a majority of conflicts: 87%

(Students don't see the difference between the Islam,often suffering from a negative portrayal by the/in the media, and the arabic culture.)

.- There are too many chinese people: 95%

(The answer of the students probably referred to the overpopulation of the World rather than to the population of Spain.)

.- Immigrants are responsible for the long queues at the doctors: 90%

(Statistics show that an overuse of medical services by the native population causes the queues and not the immigrants.)

(Examining the students answers we can see stereotypical structures in their way of thinking. Those might be caused by a lacking knowledge about the respective issues. AINDESOS wants to provide the knowledge to thus prevent discrimination and cultural conflicts.)

 

 

3.AIMS:

 

3.1 To create a link between all the different cultures, ethnic groups and religions with a view to making the exposition, the dissemination and the exchange of opinions and experiences in terms of cultural, educational, artistic and other topics easier. This is to provide a platform for members and visitors in order to create in a sustainable way a peaceful, tolerant, and democratic environment.

3.2 To contribute to a future in peaceful, intercultural coexistence by supporting immigrants in integrating into our society.

3.3 To investigate, publish and spread information about topics related to interculturality.

3.4 To facilitate activities, that reveal important values and ways of behaving in order to support the intercultural society politically, economically and culturally.

3.5 To peacefully live in intercultural coexistence.

3.6 To intervene in situations in which intercultural mediation is the ideal means to resolve conflicts.

3.7 To prevent the arising or development of conflicts in intercultural coexistence. Should we know about activities or practices which provoke conflicts, to report to the police about the offender.

3.8 To help build a consciousness in society about a future, which will constitute interculturality. Hence to promote educational models for establishing intercultural competences in society. In order to accomplish mutual tolerance and solidarity, to promote mutual respect of all cultures through support of exchange and dialogue and

hereby to develop a democratic intercultural society based on equality.

3.9 To support intercultural relations and help integration starting from coherent education for all people.

 

4. GENERAL AIMS:

 

- To create an effective platform for exchange and to promote Human Rights.

- To support immigration with the help of all workers, interns, and volunteers from AINDESOS.

- To actively take part in society and fight for every person to have a say in its decisions.

- To create a consciousness for mutual tolerance.

- To provide access for all citizens to education about culture, discrimination and Human Rights.

- To support the exchange of knowledge about all cultures and their languages to make the mutual understanding between cultures easier.

- To promote Gender equality.

- To organise projects which help accept and understand the differences between cultures.

- To support intercultural cooperation.

- To help organise centres of support for migrants.

- To promote sustainable behaviour in order to save the planet and the environment.

- To support women's rights.

 

 

 

5. FURTHER AIMS

 

- To teach social behaviour.

- To contribute to mental as well as physical security of every person.

- To strengthen empathy and selfesteem of the people we work with in order to create a peaceful environment.

- To stress the importance of social participation.

- To create a platform to exchange experiences.

- To explain behavioural structures, which come up in the educational roleplays and games we build our workshops on.

- To provide information about the consequences and problems of migration processes and support the dialogue between cultures.

 

 

6. APPROACH

 

The participation of each student and the interaction in the classroom forms the basis of each workshop. Individual participation is what makes it possible for the educator to react to the students questions and needs.

To make the understanding for certain issues easier, AINDESOS believes the workshops should mainly be inspired and guided by the students participation. In this regard we also use different tools for our workshops, for instance powerpoint and overhead projectors to illustrate the issue; newspaper articles and statistics to prove facts; case studies and discussion groups to reflect the topic and surveys, movies and evaluation to conclude workshop.

 

 

7. IN SUMMARY

 

The survey showed that students often lack profound knowledge about other cultures, migration and interculturality, which can lead to problems. Only with an education providing that knowledge it is possible to establish a peace – and respectful coexistence in society. Creating a consciousness for interculturality, thus, has to start in school already.

Here, coherent education for all people is necessary. It is based on three key features: education, transparency and application.

We know that it is important to adapt the workshops to the special needs of each group of students. Thus we try to stay updated about important current issues all the time. It is also very important to us to put ourselves in the shoes of the students so we can see where exactly they could need more information or where they still might have doubts. With our work we try to bring forward values such as equality, solidarity, mutual respect and tolerance, interculturality and sustainability.

 

 

AUTHORS

Noelia Aguilar Morillo

Carmen Mª Cabrera Alcalá

Studierte Psychopedagoginnen der

Universität von Granada.

2010-2011.

 

ADVISER:

MANUEL MORANTE POYATOS,

(CHAIR OF AINDESOS)

 

 

 

 

 

               “RIDING THE BIKE”

1. GROUNDS.

2. AIMS.

2.1 GENERAL AIMS.

2.2 FURTHER AIMS.

3. CONTENT.

4. APPROACH.

5. EVALUATION.

6. IN SUMMARY.

 

 

 

1. GROUNDS.

By doing sports kids are able to use their energy to the full and to make friends with other kids. That way sports is a means to socialize and to learn social manners at the same time. Further, it strengthens their selfesteem.

Nowadays it is known that sports helps kids to handle daily tasks better. According to the World Health Organisation sports helps people to improve their quality of life.

Further, there is a correlation between sports, referring to the bike as a means of transportation, and a consciousness for the environment and sustainability.

 

2. AIMS.

We try to inform the students about sustainable possibilities of transportation to help build a consciousness about the environment. We try to achieve this by organizing practice with bikes and also by including an informational part about environmental problems in our workshop.

2.1 GENERAL AIMS.

1. To help the students improve the coordination of the movements of their body parts.

2. To help the students to a better personal balance through sports.

3. To teach how to behave responsibly while riding bike on the road.

4. To create a consciousness for environmental problems and show the students their possibilities to affect or support the environment in behaving correctly.

5. To organize games and support companionship in the teams.

6. To practice effective cooperation in teams with the students.

7. To stress the importance of respect for the environment.

8. To work against sexist stereotypes in sports.

9. To meet the necessities of a diverse class situations while holding our lessons.

10.To inform about renewable energy and stress its importance.

 

2.2 FURTHER AIMS.

By informing about sustainability we want show that physical exercise can affect the environment and help the students on a personal as well as social level. In order to do that we try to achieve the following aims.

1. To point out the importance of taking responsibility for your body and keeping it healthy by exercising.

2. To teach riding the bike independently and securely.

3. To help the students in gaining a better blood circulation and more flexibility through exercise.

4. To reflect public transport as well as the use of cars regarding to pros and cons.

5. Cooperation in games between the students.

6. To support personal relations between the team members.

7. To lay down rules for our projects and activities. That way the students are to learn that rules, in sports as well as in life, need to be obeyed in order to achieve peaceful coexistence.

8. To help the students in gaining selfesteem through success in sports.

9. To portray our environment as a source of strength and relaxation.

10. To help the students realize their abilities and strengths in life situations on the basis of sports.

11. To convey respect for the environment.

12. To stress the importance of security measures on the road, as for example bicycle helmets.

13. To explain the way a bicycle is built in order to help the students handle it properly.

14. To help the students to get to know their area by bike.

15. To help the students to get to know the nature surrounding them by bike.

 

3. CONTENT.

1- To show up the bike as a sustainable means of transportation.

2- To lay down ground rules for the use of bikes on the road.

3- To explain the way a bicycle works.

4- To stress the importance of security on the road.

5- To examine traffic ground rules.

6- To examine sustainability with regard to ones lifestyle.

7- To bring forth mutual respect and companionship in class.    

 

4. APPROACH.     

In our workshop we follow the principle that it is the student who leads the lesson by participating. Thus, the students constitute a vital element for the workshop, while the educator only mediates the necessary information as a basis. Hence we use different tools, with regard to the different needs of all students, to visualize the information and to provide proof and inspiration for further discussion and reflection.

5. EVALUATION.

The evaluation at the end of each workshop is to show us the understanding of the students about the subject, but also about the way they experienced the workshop in its structure and content. It is a means to constantly improve our work in order to be able to bring about our information more effectively.

 

6. IN SUMMARY.

In times of globalization it is becoming more and more important to inform about sustainability and environmental problems and further to reflect ones lifestyle on the basis of that information. Each action of man affects the environment and can even have global effects. Thus, it is very important to already start informing kids in school. That way they can do the necessary to take up responsibility for their behaviour now and in the future.

We want to the students to develop a critical perspective on the world of today in relation to the environment, globalisation and diversity. With our work we try to convey tolerance, cooperation and respectful behaviour towards each other as important values for society. Also we try to teach the importance of standing up to problems both in personal and in social life.

 

Translated by Karoline Jagodzinski

student of the BA of Multilingual Communication

at the University of Applied Sciences in Cologne

June 30, 2011 Granada