THROUGH THE EYES OF THE PARTİCİPANTS

YOUTH İN LİGHT OF PERFORMATİVE ACTİVİSM: THEATRE AND HUMAN RİGHTS

By Achraf Guennouni Idrissi

Within the kaleidoscopic diversity covered by Erasmus+, human rights emerge as one of the paramount concerns which orients the purposive vision of the European Commission towards youth particularly in the spheres of formal, non-formal and vocational education. The crystallization of Erasmus+’s interest in youth participatory action is carried out through various means and includes variegated demographic strata dispersed over almost the totality of Europe, plus third countries associated to the program such as North Macedonia, Serbia, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Turkey. This article highlights one of the creative approaches adopted by Erasmus+ to foster the values of human right in European Youth

It will shed light on the value of performative arts, particularly theatre, in generating an artistic environment where youth learn as well as act their vision of human rights, and as such cultivate an atmosphere of empathy and intercultural understanding.

Over the past fifty years, performative arts have been deployed as key metaphors to rethink normative notions of selfhood, gender, masculinity, minorities, marginal communities, fine arts, culture and many other socio-economic and political issues. The brilliancy of adopting a theatrical approach to such issues resides in the fundamental principle of exposition i e , the exposition of the case at hand, from a variety of different angles, leaving enough breathing space for the actors and the audience (in our case the participants) to build their own opinion s and decisions. The value of theatre as a medium to foster human rights in youth is manifested in its performative ability to break down and expose uneasy and complex matters (such as the speech, racism, gender discrimination, Islamophobia ) into lucid and understandable series of acts which can be easily fathomed, and whose effect could immediately be detected through changes in mood, emotions, bodily gesture and so on.