Fire
for half million years
humans have been living with fire
intimately
sharing stories songs dreams and visions
but do you know it took
half a million years
before we realized we could intensify its heat
we could add different catalysts
and ores
and we could melt the minerals out of rocks and create metal
So we lived with this technology intimately
for so long
what kind of technologies are we living with today
which we still don't really understand their full potential
thats what i wonder
and i think the video camera is an example
how many of you
usually have a video camera in your pockets
A few, yeah
how many of you have one of these?
a few
quite a lot, most of you
it has become ubiquitous
enmeshed in our lives
but i think we are only just scratching the surface of what this technology
can do
and i want to show you how we're using participatory video
to introduce the right elements
to create the right conditions
to unlock
the hidden potential of this technology
This is a group we worked with in Ethiopia recently.
We're a team of trainers who work all over the world sharing our tools and
methods with community members
we're not training citizen journalists
or video activists
we're training community changemakers
that's our goal
here we have twelve of our team
that we trained
using different games and exercises to learn how to use the camera
framing and learning how to
push record, very simple, very fun
Then they start to include the wider community
to bring in their peers and their friends
And they start to look at their situation
and plan their film together
So this is collective creation, co- creation
this is something we don’t often see with video
usually it's one director but here this is the whole community, it's more like the
kind of thing we see on the internet with wikipedia
which is what we've created
but this is happening
on a local level
one community, one village
...your community.
When we arrive in the community
i put down the camera
and that's the last time I’m going to touch it
the whole time I am there
i'm not going to touch the camera
our trainers don't touch the camera
it's one of the community members who will
unzip the bag
and take out the camera for the first time
because its so important
to let go of control right from the start
that's what we're about, we need to let go of control
because we know
that this
is not a video camera
this is a people magnet
pulling people together
to join in, to get involved
to see what's going on: whats this project about?
But it also can be pulled outwards because there are a lot of people who won’t come
to that community meeting,
maybe they are too busy, maybe they are do’ers, maybe they are innovators,
They are actually out there working, they don't have time
or maybe
they feel
they've got nothing to offer
too powerless,
too poor,
too uneducated
whatever it is
This can go out towards them
and we find that in the hands of a local person this is a thousand times
more
powerful as a magnet
and they will be open
to share their stories
if it's their neighbour in front of the camera or their friend who has brought it to them,
they'll have a chance
in the comfort of their own home, their front room, their back yard
to plan their stories
and to plan their message
and then film it.
This is participatory video,
it's about making videos with the whole community
But its not just about making video,
it's about getting people together
to plan together
to unite
to take action locally
to make changes that they want to see
For lasting
positive development
which contributes to the well-being of the whole community
we need to get consensus
we need to bring the different parts of the picture together
because whether they're the poorest or the richest they all have different
knowledge
and they are all different parts of the jigsaw
and in that diversity you'll also get strength
and that's what we aim to do when we go to a community
So, this is my team
because I am here talking about me but it’s the work of a team, i couldn't do this
without a team because we challenge each other
we try to improve our methodology all the time
we're learning from each other.
So this is me over there, and this is my brother, we setup InsightShare
fifteen years ago
and this is
our growing team, they're not all there,
from around the world
all passionate people, a lot of them have social science, anthropology type
backgrounds, but not all of us, but very few of them have filmmaking backgrounds.
Which is interesting.
So we've been working in
over fifty different countries
two hundred different participatory video projects, we have been doing this a long
time in lots of different
spaces in different conditions.
this was with women in a South African township
or whether it's youth in a London estate
Or here in Brussels, it could be.
This is the chance for people to represent what they're doing
by themselves
to be able to have a voice
to be able to share and be represented
by themselves...and that is fundamentally different
There’s none of this active director passive subject
they are the directors
and in being the director
you'll find out a lot of things about the subject
You’ll learn from your peers
and they'll plan using story boards
it does mean we can work with illiterate groups
i think we have
some of the happiest cameras
in the world
These are what I call
free range cameras.
They travel the world
They have a great life,
they pass from hand to hand,
telling authentic heartfelt stories
By passing from hand to hand
People are teaching the next person
how to frame how to record,
So we see it passing from brother to sister
or from sister to friends
and friends to neighbours
this is about making videos together
as a community.
So let me tell you an example of a project this camera did
in 2011
it travelled to the village of Nongtraw
in North East India,
with indigenous Khasi community
and here again we trained
a group of twelve community members, a mixed group
Part of it is learning how to use the camera
But a big part of it is about looking at your Community in new ways.
We used
fun exercises
with drawing..
Here they are charting all the different local products they have in their community, all the different
things they produce
because we're really about focusing on the glass
half full
rather than the glass half empty, because that's a good point to start from
what is it they value about their community, what is it they love, what is it they are proud of,
who are the innovators, who are doing things because there's a lot going on
and often
there's not that much communication even within those communities.
So working together like this
they discussed
one of the big issues facing them.
They, like much of the world, have been going more and more towards cash crops
and they've stopped growing all the products they used to grow before.
The Elders talked about how in the old days they used to just go the market to buy
meat and salt and that was it
everything else was produced locally.
but now
they have to go and labour, they have to go and work
in order to be able to buy the products they need
so they
decided that they really needed to do something to
become stronger, to increase their food security
They couldn’t rely on the climate
well the Elders talked about millet because its very nutritious, it stores for ages
and it can grow on poor soils and is adaptable to different climates.
So they decided
to make a film
about millet growing and they made a little drama which I’m going to show you now.
Their actual film was fourteen minutes longer
but they have given us permission to use this film because they decided
they wanted to share this globally.
The community are invited to look at what's been shot during the day,
the rough cut we call it,
some of it is shaky, but they love watching each other and seeing themselves and
it's also a chance to start talking about the issues
and to get involved; more and more people get involved
and this is what we find
a lot of development projects have trouble
getting engagement from communities and keeping it
we find often our trouble is the opposite its about containing
the excitement and energy
So here you can see, it's not a very good photo but there were 120 people who
turned up to the last
screening in the village
and some had even came from other villages.
So now
there twenty five out of thirty five families growing millet in this village.
They have shown their film
in all the different surrounding villages
using it as a tool to inspire other communities
maybe to grow millet but also to think about what products do they have that
are possibly being lost that can be given new meaning
and new sense and help them towards their food security.
The film has also been shown in Sweden at the indigenous Terra Madre (Slow food festival)
and in the Philippines at conferences with scientists
and development workers
in this way
local solutions are able to
be spread
globally
but our first goal is always the local goal,
because I am bad at football and I know that the closer you are to go the goal the more likely you
are going to get
the ball in.
Next this camera travelled
back to Oxford and sat in our cupboard I think for a while, then it went to Guatemala
again we worked with local partners, we always do, with local NGOs
or community groups
Here we used participatory video to train
a group of twelve rural indigenous
adolescent girls; so probably some of the most
under-served population in Guatemala I would say.
also a very difficult group to work with potentially and
the work was focusing on
sexual health education
and overcoming violence, also very
difficult issues.
How do you do that with video?
Well we want to go a step further and what we're trying to do now
we're trying to really
improve
the way development is happening, make it more accountable
By enabling the people who are supposed to be helped by aid and
development
to say directly what they think is good about the project
what's working and what isn't working,
what impact it's made on their lives or what impact hasn’t it made
It’s kind of obvious, but it's just not been happening till now
and its so important to be able to make this link directly from the communities
on the ground to the development
and ngos and donors
sitting in their offices thousands of miles away.
We train them to use the video camera
and to go out
and record the stories of change
of their peers. Some of them
were harrowing some beautiful
and inspiring
some very sad.
What it did was really encourage
a sense of solidarity, they saw that the issues that
other girls were facing
Were similar all across the region
and now they want to
really become
leaders in their community to fight for the rights of adolescent girls
as part of this program which is doing such a great
job to support them with the Population Council.
This for us wasn't enough
...that’s good; they are collecting
the information,
they are keeping control of that information.
We want to go step further
because usually the analysis and evaluation of these kind of things is done by an
outside expert.
We want the local experts to do this
and so we're developing tools, games and video and drama and drawing
to help them look at what's happening what information is coming through
these stories and mapping these trends
in meaningful ways which is giving them information
which they can then make video recommendations directly to the donor.
usually they have to wade through the piles of papers on their desk.
This was very different
and it was coming from
the beneficiaries
directly.
These girls were able to make a change,
they’ve given talks to the United Nation, they went to a conference in Turkey on
women's rights.
Two weeks ago we held a webinar which was attended by
Development leaders and ngo leaders all working in girl programming, they were
there and they addressed those people across the world and that’s what we want to
see more of.
It’s more than just about
putting video cameras in the hands of locals,
this needs to be done
with care, respect
and with a particular attitude and intention.
It is so important to create a safe space
for example where they can share openly
any community but
this case is an obvious one
how do you do that? One of the ways
is that they are the ones who control
what goes in the film and what doesn't go in the film,
they're the ones who decide where the film is shown, is it shown locally
Is it shown globally,
maybe it's not shown at all.
Sometimes you have to be ready to hear that
and let go because they are in control, they are the owners and this is how i think
it should be
and this changes everything
because the whole community get involved
and they become
able to use the tool
for their own changes.
It’s so important for development workers
to be listening more to communities, we are hearing that all the time,
we need to listen.
Well a lot of people find it difficult to listen,
Its rare we are able to talk like this without interruptions...
But this
is not a video camera,
this is an empathetic ear,
it can listen
without interruptions, without judgment.
You can have a chance to share your message
If you’re a local innovator, you can share
what you're doing and how you’re doing it
and you'll want to
that's what we find, they do want to
because you're still connected with it, it gives you kudos
These messages, personal messages can then be shared with the whole community at screenings
and discussed
And then hey we should go and film this guy and interview that guy and lets do a film about this
this is a big issue.
So it goes forwards like that.
This is also a mirror,
it gives communities a chance to see themselves in a fresh way, not the warts
and the pimples,
but the best sides of themselves; people doing things
People with ideas,
that's what they see and it gives them hope
and it takes them forwards.
This is a torch
helping
communities research the issues
that they're facing,
uncover the solutions and people who are doing things already.
So this is not a
video camera,
This is actually a form of
space travel...
Im not talking about the Tardis
But this can take
the communities into places they wouldn't normally be able to access into the
offices of the local policymaker
or the national policy maker
or maybe globally,
crossing these boundaries
Targeted audiences
to build on what Matthew said its so important to target the audience and
reach them in the best way you can.
So celebrate that's one of our core values
The others are make mistakes which everyone has talked about,
losing control,
each one teach one,
and celebrate.
This is an important part of development and it's something that's
not done enough but every community screening
is a celebration.
A celebration of local power
and local opportunities for change.
So this is not a video camera,
it's a champion for change if we use it
in the right way
and we use it with our best intentions and we pass it over and lose control.
Thank you.