Comdev Projects

Youth in Transition is the name of a new collaboration blog project between the School of Arts and Communication (K3) at Malmö University and the Department of Fine and Performing Arts, University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. The purpose of the blog, which was launched in February 2012, is to bring together students and teachers from both universities in order to engage in peer reviewing and presenting student research collaborations in the media and arts field. The students involved in the collaboration come from courses part of the master program in Communication for Development, as well as courses part of the bachelor level program in Media and Communication Studies at Malmö University, and Fine and Performing Art, Dar es Salaam.

Currently the students work on four sub-topics within the major theme “Youth in Transition”:
- From the Village to the City – young peoples travel into a new urban environment, negotiating rural/suburban and urban lives and cultures.
- Tales of My Roots and Routes– an exploration of the notion of roots, routes and ‘tribe’. The latter can be understood in a Tanzanian sense, where the notion of tribe is well-known, and also debated and contested. In this perspective/avenue of work you may also investigate other meanings, i.e. senses of belonging and heritage.  This avenue give you an opportunity to focus on different layers of identity, to sub-culture, gangs, societies, social movements, community and narration of history, collective memory and the present. One belonging relates to others.
- Genderbender – Masculinity and Femininity in the city, at university, at home, among my peers. How to be a girl, boy, a person today in the communities we live.
- Jamming in the City – Traffic jams, cultural jams, drum jam, jammed houses, jammed futures? The notion of ‘cultural jamming’ taken in a variety of directions, mixture, re-cycling, appropriation (détournement?) of cultural influences, from food to architecture

The collaboration features also teachers exchange, and as part of that, Ylva Ekström from K3 (on the upper photo in the middle), Malmö University was in Tanzania for several weeks in March 2012 to teach, facilitate and guide students in Dar es Salaam working mainly around radio productions. There she worked with, among others, Charles Mustapha Kayoka (on photo to the left) who is currently at Malmö University and facilitating group work as well as teaching there. Project coordinator at Malmö University is Anders Høg Hansen, while in Dar es Salaam it is Herbert Makoye.

To learn more or join the blog you can visit its official website here.
All are welcome to comment and join the discussion!

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