Clean & Write © 2022 project
Basic information
Project Title
Full project title
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Project Description
The activities to be carried out will apply a methodology derived from the idea of the project "Clean & Write © 2022". This pedagogical methodology aims to combine environmental protection with creative and collaborative writing. The idea aims to: develop a new green practice that combines useful purposes for the environment and the creativity of young people and adults participating in the eco-social change; - create an intergenerational and ethical community in Palermo.
Geographical Scope
Project Region
Urban or rural issues
Physical or other transformations
EU Programme or fund
Which funds
Description of the project
Summary
The Clean & Write © 2022 project aims to provide an opportunity to strengthen active citizenship by linking two fundamental aspects of people's lives: Environment and Creativity, translated into: Cleaning and Writing. Specifically, meetings will be organized to restore public spaces that will be revitalized with operational and ethical actions.The activities to be carried out will use a methodology derived from the project "Clean & Write: places to rewrite". This pedagogical methodology aims to combine environmental protection with creative and collaborative writing. Therefore, each month different actions are planned in advance of the actual meeting. The first actions concern the creation of the online event and its dissemination in the region and social networks. Every month, for twelve months, with the next writing time, sanitation and cleaning actions will be carried out. The activity will include a first moment of cleaning with specially selected professional materials. The second moment will be dedicated instead to the narration of the experience that took place. In this way, it will be possible to clean eleven different public spaces in twelve months, involving the citizens of the area, residents of the neighborhoods, institutions, associations and interest groups. A monthly team meeting between the volunteers and the organizing group is planned.
Key objectives for sustainability
In twelve months, the project aims to: - develop a new green practice that combines useful purposes for the environment and the creativity of young people and adults engaged in eco-social change; - create opportunities to bring into being an intergenerational community that works together to preserve the city as an asset to be protected together; - the reclamation and enhancement of eleven public spaces in Palermo as a basis for the realization of a new idea of intergenerational social activism; - the promotion of the creativity of the youth in the area and the talents in the city; - the creation of a new, positive, optimistic and sustainable image of the city; - the publication of a book that testifies to the experiences made. The change that the association hopes to achieve is a concrete impact on the environment and the surroundings of Palermo, especially on the public spaces in the urban and extra-urban suburbs. The impact that will result will be through a citizen mobilization that aims to create a community of good practices, starting from the problems that have been expressed and have emerged in the debates between the members of the association in dialog with citizens and stakeholders. Developing communities also means working together for a common good. Therefore, the privileged object of this project will be the city, which will be cleaned and rewritten together, so that the identity of the suburbs and public spaces is retold and remembered. In this sense, the project is aimed at individuals and families who live near public spaces that are degraded and polluted, in order to bring about environmental change from below, with the help of all citizens, not excluding people from outside the selected areas. The specific target is the members of the association (70 people) and other people, families, young people, who will be equipped with paper, pen and materials for the hygiene and cleaning of spaces (50 people) for a collective mobilization.
Key objectives for aesthetics and quality
The goals that the project aims to achieve in one year are related to three macro areas. The first concerns the area of integration and diversity. In this context, the aim is to reduce the social gap and the gap between generations. The protagonists are the people who live in the same neighborhood. They work together to rehabilitate the neglected areas of the same environment to which they belong. The second macro area concerns the field of environmental protection, sustainable development and climate action. It aims to improve the quality of life of the residents of the vulnerable neighborhoods by planning and implementing the rehabilitation of public spaces in the city with replicable and sustainable green practices. The third macro area concerns participation in democratic life. It can be built through the diffusion of good green practices that combine environmental protection with creativity. In practice, this means redesigning the territory, understood as an opportunity to promote a sense of community and sustainability of time. Each meeting includes an initial phase of outreach and promotion of the Clean & Write events, facilitated by digital tools, a social media strategy, and word of mouth. In the here and now of the meeting, there will be a moment of cleaning urban spaces (Clean), a green practice in which all appropriate equipment and professionals will be used in complete safety to clean up the spaces selected by the project, and a subsequent creative moment (Write) to complete the Newbookclub community lab meeting. In the "Clean" moment, all participants will be asked to volunteer and work together to clean the dilapidated and/or abandoned spaces using materials provided by the club. In the moment "Write" you will write a story, poem or song whose protagonist is the space in which it is operated. The story of the experience will be documented with photos, videos and texts that will be published on the social pages of the association.
Key objectives for inclusion
The idea for the project Clean & Write © 2022: places to rewrite came from an internal debate within the "Newbookclub community lab" in dialog with the suburbs of the Palermo region (divided into eight districts), where many supporters of the lived association live. The suburbs of Palermo represent most of the times of the border areas - but also centrally - defined as vulnerable areas due to urban neglect, crime, educational poverty and services targeted to the people. The project mentioned above, starting from the first problem expressed (urban neglect), wants to create an intergenerational activism within the capital Palermo. The Clean & Write project wants to be an opportunity to strengthen active citizenship by linking two fundamental aspects of people's lives: Environment and Creativity, expressed through cleaning and writing. Specifically, meetings are organized to restore public spaces that will be resumed with operational and ethical actions involving the local population in the areas mentioned. The protagonists of this intervention are children, young people and adults who, under the direction of the association Newbookclub community lab, clean public spaces such as parks, squares, gardens, beaches, streets, villas, etc., abandoned or semi-abandoned, to return them to the citizens in their ideal form, and finally tell their transformation by choosing them as a contest of stories that they write in the here and now of the meeting. Thanks to the project, you want to take care of your city and all the places that have fallen into disrepair and are in danger of being forgotten and abandoned.
Physical or other transformations
Innovative character
The aim and main purpose is to create a good green "Clean & Write" practice that is disseminated throughout the local area with a view to the European Union for the objectives set out in the Agenda in relation to the European Green Deal and green environmental actions. A practice that fits into the methodology to reinforce bottom-up actions and involve a community of interest that aims to save common spaces. Again, it will be writing - the preferred medium of the Ass. Newbookclub Community Lab - to share the experience on a narrative level, creating a chapter in which citizens, the city, and a new social activism based on the concept of good emerge as protagonists, preserved together for the citizens of today and for the future. At the end of the project is the commitment to carry out cultural and literary initiatives that also offer an environmentally sustainable approach.
