Talking Difference
I was recently asked to be involved in a project run by the Immigration Museum of Melbourne called Talking Difference. The project is an exciting and ambitious attempt to use transmedia storytelling to engage high-school-aged kids on the topic of race-based discrimination and stereotyping. The project is already in its second or third year, this time integrating a fantastic creative element which allows students to express their thoughts, feelings and insights about race-based discrimination using transmedia as a framework for production. I am thrilled to be a part of this project. For me, it represents the perfect meeting of social awareness, education, creative output and youth empowerment.
Indeed they will be.
My role in the project is as educational consultant, which basically means I get involved with each high-school at the beginning of the project (we work with two schools per semester) and introduce the kids to this fancy, fangled thing we know and love as transmedia. That way, they have some idea of what they’re doing and the logic driving it when they get into the workshops and start producing.
I did the first session around two weeks ago, and I must say, as someone who is used to dealing mostly with scholars, industry folk and university students it was a welcome challenge to devise a strategy for engaging the lunch-box crowd. I found it enlightening, deeply satisfying and fun. Being forced to discuss transmedia in its most basic elementary form imbued the subject with a sense of clarity which is often missing in most adult conversations. Plus, I got to use a light saber as a prop, and how cool is that? (That was rhetorical of course, since the coolness of using a light saber as a prop is impossible to measure using known scientific methods). Needless to say, I think the kids really enjoyed it, but more importantly, I think the session gave them a real sense of what transmedia is and how they can become transmedia producers. Used as a tool for enabling young people to have a voice in the national conversation on race-based discrimination, I think this transmedia project will have far-reaching implications. This is one to watch. Be sure to check out the website here for more information.
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