The realization of the project “All faces of activism”, which includes young people aged 15 to 30 from Dragocaj, Celinac, Srbac, Kotor Varos, Laktasi and Prnjavor, has successfully begun. The project has been implemented by the Genesis Project from Banja Luka, and its goal is for participants to learn the basics of journalism and civic activism and make their own short film or photo story.
The project includes 40 young people from these municipalities who have participated in six workshops to date, in which they learned the basics of journalism, civic activism, filming with a mobile phone, the basics of directing and editing and screenwriting.
All workshops are held online, and after the training, young people will show everything they have learned through a film or photo story, and the best five authors will win a tablet.
Mentors from the Genesis Project point out that this type of online work is much more difficult than live work, because concentration of participants is at a higher level in person, there is greater interaction between participants and the possibility of non-verbal communication and the like.
“However, the young people impressed me, who (despite all the shortcomings) accepted this way of working and their awareness to adapt to the current world situation and this way of working as the only possible one. Their willingness to learn about these topics and to personally engage to point out the problems in their local communities, but also the problems of society as a whole, is something that restores my faith in the future! In the following period, we have to see how they will “transform” their (great!) Ideas into films so that the messages reach the eyes and ears of the general public”, pointed out Ljubiša Vasić, one of the mentors from the Genesis Project.
His colleague Draško Stojčević agrees with him, saying that the online way of working is more complicated and therefore more difficult in relation to direct contact with the participants, but that a large part of young people still accepted online communication as something that is completely normal and close to them.
“Although there was initially a certain amount of uncertainty to point out the problems in their local communities, most of the participants understood what were the topics they wanted to address and what were the problems in their local communities that they wanted to point out with their short films. It is very encouraging and a sign that young people can get involved and that they just need space to be able to promote their ideas “, said Stojčević.
The “All Faces of Activism” project is enabled thanks to the support of Bosnia and Herzegovina Resilience Initiative (BHRI), implemented by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and financially supported by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
