This project arises in response to the need to make visible and exploit the social value and opportunities offered by cultural heritage and art, from three perspectives that are totally and necessarily complementary: (a) To train educational and socio-cultural youth workers in the use of non-formal education and social research strategies for the dissemination of European cultural heritage and art, while experimenting, renewing and improving their skills in professional performance as facilitators of real, active and creative youth participation and youth empowerment. (b) to disseminate and enhance cultural heritage and art among young people, in order to support their critical, civic and creative development and to equip them with tools that promote new scenarios and spaces of expression, renewed channels of participation, connection and dialogue. (c) To promote the transmission of culture and art as a rich and diverse patrimonial element, suitable in today’s reality as an educational tool, for healthy leisure, for social and intergenerational relations, with an integrative vocation, giving priority to equality of persons and non-discrimination on grounds of gender, class or age. It is important to break with the elitist, consumerist and stereotypical idea of culture, heritage and art, to connect and integrate the elements involved in its transmission and to seek joint responsibility among the actors involved in disseminating it without discriminatory stereotypes. To achieve our mission, an 18-month strategy has been designed in which young people between the ages of 13 and 18 and youth workers from three countries will exchange good practices and experiment with new methods to encourage participation, connection and youth empowerment in an ambitious process based on the training-research-action methodology. The attitudinal and procedural issues will be approached from 3 essential contents, according to the specialties of each one of the entities that make up the strategic partnership: (a) gender focus and co-educative strategies; (b) artistic and performative techniques; (c) social research techniques, interview and collection of oral testimonies. The main activities in which the project become operative: The main activities in which project will be active are: -Youth exchange, with the objective to analyze the gender stereotype in force in the cultural and artistic areas, to share the social investigations process and to edit the digital content started in the previous months and that will continue in the coming month, to empower youth into an artistic and critic collective creation and to give visibility to the artistic European cultural heritage. - Research, mapping and audiovisual record: this work include the identification of 5 “muses” in each country, study visits, interviews and audiovisual records with mobile phones, video editing and dissemination in RRSS. As result of this process, we will collect a gallery of 15 videos about inspiring experiences of creative people, artists and/or those who work in the cultural and arts fields, to compare prejudices based on gender and show diversity and wealth of European cultural and artistic heritage. In addition, interactive maps and teaching guides will be elaborated to make their use more attractive and useful. - Design, development and evaluation of the cultural revitalization activities for teenagers in each territory, in collaboration with the respective network of local partners and using a multitude of formats and supports. A total of 15 activities will be designed, 5 per country, in direct relation to the different cultural areas mapped and registered in the process of social research and identification of the “muses”. - Development of the teaching guide “Cultural dynamization with gender perspective for teenagers”, with a compendium of activities available in the project channels to be used, replicated and / or adapted by whoever wishes. The quality of the proposed activities will be backed by the experience of the partner entities, the large network of local partners and by the rigorous evaluation process that will be promoted. -Elaboration of an illustrated infografic with pedagogical recommendation for youth workers, with the most important conclusions regarding the intervention in the field of the dissemination of cultural heritage and of art with the teenagers group. It is a project whose results will be of great utility for professionals in the educational area, (formal or non-formal), in the cultural and heritage area since they will be backed by exhaustive experimentation and evaluation, and will be capable of being applied in their contexts of intervention. We want the actions, products and results of the project to be inspiring, practical and fully transferable, so they will be multilingual and available online under a Creative Commons license.
a) Train youth workers in the educational and sociocultural field in the use of non-formal education and social research strategies for the dissemination of European cultural heritage and art, while at the same time experimenting, renewing and improving their professional performance skills as facilitators of real, active and creative youth participation and youth empowerment. b) Disseminate and value cultural heritage and art among young audiences, with a view to supporting their own critical, civic and creative development, and to provide them with tools that promote new scenarios and spaces of expression, renewed channels of participation, connection and dialogue. c) Promote the transmission of culture and art as a rich and diverse heritage element, suitable in today's reality as an educational tool, for healthy leisure, for social and intergenerational relations, with an integrating vocation, prioritizing the equality of people and not discrimination based on gender, class or age. d) Exchange good practices with other similar entities in Europe. e) Create and disseminate results and methods to spread European cultural heritage from non-formal education.
MUSES arises from the need to develop new methods and share good practices in the face of gaps in the training of professionals for the dissemination of cultural heritage in the adolescent group and, above all, because of their detachment from their own culture. We believe that poorly oriented activities are proposed, that do not connect young people with their own culture, but adolescents who observe these contents from the outside, as if it were something foreign to them. If we add the breaking of the chain of intergenerational transmission, the devaluation of cultural heritage, cultural globalization..., a bleak picture is drawn and a need to address the issue from more innovative, participatory and creative approaches. This methodological reformulation is offered by non-formal education, since it allows us to search for new scenarios and approaches, efficient channels of participation and dialogue, giving adolescents real prominence and connecting with their cultural heritage in a constructive way. We diagnose the need to guide these practices (facilitation of real youth participation with a creative approach and dissemination of cultural heritage) with clear social values such as gender equality and equity.