ARES: Film & homo/transphobia

ARES (AR.E.S: ARtistic Educational System for the Social Inclusion of young Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender adults) is a network of artists, teachers, youth workers and youth who are interested in studying the relationship between art, media and LGBTI emancipation, and want to promote a good use of art and media in formal and informal education.
From August 2013 to July 2015, 5 European organizations are supported by the European Long Life Learning Grundtvig Program (grant reference 2013-1-IT2-GRU06-52307-1) to make exchange visits and explore this issue. The budget was limited to travel and accommodation.

The ARES YouTube channel, The Facebook page and the mailing list remain active after the projet an are maintained by GALE.

Objectives

The ARES project aimed to develop adult educational strategies for the social inclusion of young adult LGBT people. In this project, we use artistic and cultural media (ACM) like cinema and theatre. There is evidence that ACM can play a role in addressing social exclusion, ignorance and misrepresentation of sexual diversity.

Partners

There are 5 partners:

ENFAP Toscana – Italy (www.enfap-toscana.org): training center of a trade union
GALE - Netherlands (www.gale.info): international organization on LGBT education
RINOVA Ltd – United Kingdom, (www.rinova.co.uk): trainining center for young adults
SEKU - Estonia (www.seky.ee): LGBT advocacy organization
Szczecinskie Centrum Edukacyjne Sp z o.o. – Poland. (www.sce.com.pl)): trainining center for young adults

Activities

The partners organizations meet 6 times during the project to discuss the role of sexual diversity in films and how to use films in an educational way. Next to the partners themselves, they will take learners with them to meetings. The experiences will lead to the development of ways to create non-formal learning process by analysis of the contents (screenplays, plays and video) of LGBT artistic and cultural media. The project will also promote a dialogue between local government, adult education providers, cultural associations, experts with LGBT associations concerning public policies to tackle homophobia and transphobia using ACM as a vehicle.

Communication

You can find ongoing information about the ARES activities on our a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/aresnetwork and our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/aresnetworkvideo. You can also join our interactive mailing list art&lgbteducation (or leave this list) by using this form.

Final international products:

ARES 2nd Press release (recommendation to focus on training)
ARES Educational Guideline (suggestions how to use film to combat homophobia)
ARES Portfolio (format to describe acquired competences)
ARES 1st Press Release (project announcement)
ARES Project Brochure (short description of the project)

Newsletters:

Products of GALE based on experiences in the Netherlands: