The Founding Director, Sierra James, has written the story below describing the emergence of the Transformative Arts and Human Rights Education program.
"Post-Conflict Reconstruction: Transformation through the Arts"
After hours of artistic activities, short lectures and interactive learning, we call it a day. We make our way down the trail, which has become a stream, and wind our way through pathways avoiding the men with machetes to return safely home.
Sadly, with the rise of intrastate warfare in Timor-Leste, the number of children affected by conflict is skyrocketing. However, programming that provides children and youth with the knowledge and skills to solve problems without violence will make peace in Timor-Leste feasible over the long run.
Timor-Leste has a history of repression. It was a colony of Portugal for over four hundred years, the Japanese occupied parts of its territory during World War II, and then it was brutally annexed between 1975 and 1999 by its closest neighbor, Indonesia. .
Endemic social trauma in Timor-Leste brought with it a widespread lack of self-confidence, stifling creativity and entrepreneurship and a perpetuating cycle of violence and victimization. Timor-Leste’s history has left a legacy that today manifests itself in the form of pervasive domestic violence, sexual violence against women, fear, shame and a general sense of disempowerment. While the effects of conflict and poverty impact the population as a whole, children, because of their vulnerability and dependence, are disproportionately affected.
Despite the obvious need for programs to address children’s conflict experiences, these did not exist. After three short months living in Timor-Leste, I fell in love with its people and sense of community; I knew that had to do something to improve their situation.
A colleague of mine, Danielle Ujvari, and I decided to combine our skills, hers in human rights and mine in conflict resolution training, to create a program in which we would use artistic activities to facilitate conversations about human rights and conflict resolution with children and youth. We targeted those young people living in orphanages specifically because they were some of those most severely affected by the conflict.
We worked to incorporate drama, drawing and other artistic activities into the programming, as we knew from experience that positive shifts can take place when altered states of consciousness are activated through artistic expression. Painting and drawing can provide a safe place where feelings and memories are released in much the same way as they are in therapy sessions. Weeks of exploration and research led to the Transformative Arts and Human Rights Education (TAHRE) program’s innovative melding of art, conflict resolution and human rights pedagogies. Through providing participants with a venue for processing their experiences of conflict, the program helps them arrive at better understanding of themselves and their role in society.
The TAHRE curriculum draws on the experience of similar programming done by WarChild in Kosovo, which found that organizing creative activities for children in post-conflict areas contributes substantially to their well-being. This type of psychosocial programming offers participants the chance to be children, regain their self-confidence and joy, in order to help them look to the future.
From the very first implementation of the TAHRE program, it has seen an increased ability for children to articulate their interests and needs. It has also built participants’ self-confidence and awareness about their role in creating a better world. There is no doubt that it will continue to change people’s perspectives and subsequently their lives over the coming years. By facilitating healing among young people affected by the conflict, and raising knowledge of human rights and their relevance in day-to-day living, the TAHRE program works to break the cycle of violence in Timor-Leste. It creates a culture of peace by contributing to the potential for a strong, democratic and human rights based society.
Tropical rain pounds on the tin roof schoolhouse. The class is mesmerized by its pulse. It surges, fades and surges again. Finally, as the rain slows and the noise dies down, we can hear each other once agaiin.
We pick up where we left off, Human Rights Lesson II. The advertisements that the children are creating have taken form. Each one represents a different article of the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights: “the right to education, the right to freedom of expression…” As the lesson gets back underway the pitter-patter of rain resumes, signifying that the clouds have not yet emptied.
