Day 4 - exploring stereotypes

What a great way to start the day... a beautiful sunrise! This was an amazing energy. The adventure started at 10am as usual. The topic of the day was exploring stereotypes. First, we had a greetings game, a possibility to explore different ways to say hi! Our planet is divided into many different countries which all have different manners. Each country has its own way to greet people. It was a matter of culture (we explored French, Japan, Polynesia etc). We noticed the way of greeting is totally different in each country or area. The greeting is necessary for communicating with whomever and wherever they live. What we found interesting was that although we use all these gestures to greet oneanother, there was more: the way we do it, we share a little bit of our culture and customs. And something funny ixix (Serkan - the way to say hi... he had to spit on other's feet to greet them!!!) But this exercise was just for introducing us the main topic.

Stereotype are a general statement about a group of people based on incomplete information, impressions made by the mass media, culture and history based knowledge.

During the next activity that we had, we were supposed to get our hands together and listen to sentences and decide if it related to us. We had to take one step forward or back depending on the way we consider it - an advantage or a disadvantage. There were certain things that let some of us behind and others were steps ahead (Michel for example didn't have enough room so he almost went out in the snow) We discovered the things that pushed us forward were mostly features and characteristics that were determined from the moment of our birth. What we found interesting as well was the fact that despite there were some of us behind, we tried not to break the chain and stick together.

Next activity: each of us got to pick up a piece of paper with a word written on it.. namely our new identity. The main aim was to imagine ourselves as this person and walk in that person's shoes, trying to answer questions about our daily lives. In particular, how things would change, would we have more or less opportunities and understanding from our friends, family and from the society. We all found this exercise quite difficult in a way that this single word was changing every single thing that we considered part of our existence. Afterwards, we were divided into groups of 5 and had discussions on what we did and the way we felt and what we had experienced.

Here are some of the questions:

1. List 5 specific ways you believe your life will change.
2. Predict how others will respond to you, attitudes of your immediate family, close friends, community and society as a whole.
3. What will you need and/or expect from others that you may not have needed or expected before.
4. As this new person, do you believe you have more or less power in your workplace? In society?

Last part of this journey through our stereotypes was a labeling game:

"First word that comes to mind". We had to associate the word written on the paper with the feeling and thought that it provokes in us and write it down on a sheet of paper.

We had to admit, it was a long day full of activities. We were tired but what was important was that we had learned so much about ourselves and about the stereotypes that we use to judge people and label them.

Rosica, Csaba, Alexa, Tsvetelin