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FUN: Fun, Unity, New

2023-3-DE04-KA152-YOU-0001769432023Mobility of young peoplefinalized
Countries: DE|TR|ES · Grant: €12,589
Creativity, arts and cultureCultural heritageEuropean identity and values

Objectives

During the pandemic, amidst natural disasters and wars happening around the world, we all needed a good dose of humor and laughter for the sake of our mental well-being. Humour often came to us unnoticed or unconsciously, sometimes indirectly or very directly, and it took a significant place in our lives. Every culture, society, and individual has a sense of humour. Scientific research showed that laughter is very beneficial for health, even speeding up patient recovery times. Other psychological and sociological studies on humour indicated that it could positively influence our lives, though it can also have negative effects. Much of the importance of humour has not yet been fully understood. Humour can be seen as making jokes, sharing certain images, telling funny stories, or simply saying the right thing at the right time, but it is much more than that. With the “FUN: Fun, Unity, New” project, we wanted to discuss, analyse, and try to understand how humour is perceived and its presence in different cultures, and how various cultures react in different situations. We aimed to use humour, a common and universal trait, to understand and enhance its role in our culture and work. We believed that humour played a key role in changing common misunderstandings, prejudices, and negative thoughts and behaviours regarding different cultures. For this reason, we wanted to prioritize it in an international project and we wanted young people to engage with various types of humour and be able to apply them in future activities and projects. We also wanted to analyse the role of humour in social media, which is widely used by young people everywhere, and to explore its connection to the social, cultural, and political life of different countries. Additionally, we aimed to explore and develop humour's role in a more practical way, combining it with non-formal education methods and some artistic and theatrical techniques. We planned to use humour in ice-breaking games, team-building activities, group work, leadership development, presentation techniques, and effective communication methods. As humour brings people together and forms the basis of effective learning methods, its function and significance in youth work had not been adequately analysed, and we wanted to highlight its importance and develop new tools for future youth projects. We designed our project using a combination of creative and interactive non-formal educational methods and theatrical techniques to achieve the following specific objectives: - Gather people from different gender, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds, fostering an open dialogue space and active participation; - Raise awareness about the realities of our society and each country concerning humour and other social issues, promoting understanding and consciousness; - Understand how humour can positively affect young people and our societies; - Develop critical thinking and strengthen personalities by promoting tolerance, respect, and teamwork; - Foster a sense of shared values and belonging to Europe, enhancing European values; - Raise awareness of cultural diversity at local, regional, and international levels; - Identify and share similarities and differences in everyday life across different countries; - Provide opportunities to meet partner groups and develop concrete ideas for future projects focusing on cultural diversity and active participation of young people in their communities; - Increase knowledge about the Erasmus+ Programme to support the development of future projects; - Develop skills and attitudes to motivate participants to create media content, videos, and other artistic activities to raise awareness about cultural diversity; - Use social media actively to reach as many people as possible with the outcomes of our project and to increase the visibility of the Erasmus+ Programme.

Project partners (3)