Communication Between Children is Basis for Development
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Lina Kosturova-Unkovska, Director of the Centre for Psychosocial and Crisis Action, has worked on post-conflict stress and trauma treatment, as well as community development through activities designed for children, since the start of wars in former Yugoslavia. The interview was taken from Gragjanski svet newsletter.
The Centre for Psycho-Social and Crisis Action, under its “School Networks – Communities for Multicultural Development” project, recently organized a series of creative workshops, under the name “Freedom of Communication FOR...”, at the “Mala stanica” multimedia centre in Skopje. What was the goal of this type of work and this project? What results did it yield?
How would you estimate the current situation in Macedonia in the field of communication among the students in their growth into individuals who have the need to overcome the existing barriers created by political and social changes? The communication between children, especially through game and exchange, is the foundation for all development. In early adolescence, that contact becomes so important for the child that it occasionally manage to suppress even the closest relationship with the parents. The school is a social environment, with enormous unused potential for learning through game play and experimentation. It includes the need to maintain communication between all members of the school community, on all levels and in all directions – between various ages, sexes and cultures, with a variety of instruments and mechanisms. The school is, possibly, the only place that provides a safe environment for learning through experience, various forms of cooperation, encouragement and sharing with the others – how to communicate one’s views, wishes, expectations, injustice, but also to openly be or experience something else. These capacities are rarely used in our schools. To the contrary, they are dominated by avoidance and isolation and retreat in small, closed circles. The overall situation of long-term changes and continued expectations for something to happen can possibly explain the mistrust and the need for people to seek isolation, each to “his/her own”. There is no exchange, no growth, it seems that everything stands still... The solution for this situation lies in the opposite, in what seems impossible, unusual or strange – the reapproachment isntead the distancing; openness and curiosity as replacement of the negative prognosis. In order to turn the circle, we need to learn how to create new spaces and organize them differently – as space of play and freedom, safe to try new knowledge and experience, expand the boundaries of the possible. The children do it spontaneously and it comes easy to them to participate in joint projects and actions (both children and adults) within the community. We can learn a lot from them, if only we took them seriously. Your “Safe School” project, implemented in Tetovo in 2002-2003, was the first multiethnic manifestation after the 2001 conflict. To what extent is this, but also the other positive examples, applicable in the work of the schools? This was our first experience of “intervention action” in the region, after the conflict and it was not merely a manifestaion. It was, indeed, a two-year project of a group of children from “Lirija” elementary school in Tetovo, who started workshops on children rights and their participation in the community, in order to reach the idea for networking, which was later explored and ultimately realized as a manifestation. School children from 5th to 8th grade took part in the performance, from the two communities (Macedonian and Albanian) and performed a variety of programmes of their own choice. The children that study at the same school for years and, yet, never meet eachother because they go in different shifts, spent days on arrangement of the performance for their parents. It was the first time for the parents, too, to get together in a single hall. Naturally, it wasn’t easy. It demanded long preparations, patience and competent leadership by the adults that can be trusted. The manner in which the children got involved in the whole process of preparation demonstrated their incredible dedication, self-asuredness and dignity surpassed all expectations of the adults. The children proved that they could deal with the most delicate subjects and issues, such as networking in a post-conflict community, thus becoming a model of behaviour for the others. Lamentably, we rarely have the opportunity to see that, because of the problems created by the adults, the great majority of whom view the projects of the children as games and attempts to pass the leisure time, after which they should get on with more serious stuff, failing to note their achievements. They fail to understand that the game play is the most serious thing, the one that needs to be cherished and nourished. To what extent do you use foreign experience and assistance, but also the existing domestic resources in your work, starting from the break-up of former Yugoslavia to this day? Foreign experience, especially experts’ opinion in the area of crisis management, trauma and healing, were very useful, especially at the very start of wars in these parts. During the break-up of former-Yugoslavia, we had little knowledge about the war trauma, or the nature and treatment of post-traumatic stress syndrome. Our first experiences in that field were the meetings with the young army recruits – returnees from the ranks of former JNA, in 1991. Soon after, we had a possibility to connect with some prominent international experts in the field, such as Bob Pynoos from the U.S., Atle Diregrow and Nora Sweas from Norway, the Israel School for Aid to Aiders, the Oxford International Centre for Refugee Issues, etc. There was, however, one atypical situation that we all found ourselves in. With the start of the break-up of Yugoslavia, we suddenly found ourselves playing a double role of both professionals that were expected to provide help, and simultaneously victims, ourselves hit by the wars and the fear for our own safety because of the conflict. Refugees started arriving to Macedonia from all parts of Yugoslavia, and that was our people back then. To us, the psychologists, this was a great professional, but also human challenge. Without the experience and skills necessary to create a division and distance between the two roles, the work quickly brought up to the age of burn-out, and we all went through it, without exception. For me, personally, that was the most difficult period, but also the most fruitful period from professional point of view. In such circumstances, one has to learn quickly and hands on, and the process of maturing is faster. For many people in my profession, that time put a deep mark on their professional interests, engagement and development. Psychology as a discipline, for better or for worse, does experience greatest growth during wartime, which means that it was largely built on the mass misery of other people. Our experience as both helpers and victims has taught us something else, to view the trauma as an integral part of human experience that one doesn’t necessary have to face, but once he/she faces it, there is possibility to overcome it successfully. With that view in mind, we left the field of clinical diagnostics and created a much greater space for activation of natural resources which, we learned from the people we offered assistance to, are abundant in the human beings and in the community, especially in times of hardship. The Centre for Psychosocial and Crisis Action is a professional agency tha works on projects. Are you satisfied with the past level of cooperation and communication with national and local institutions, schools, non-governmental organizations? We are the first, and to my knowledge the only private professional agency in Macedonia that works in crisis intervention and involves whole communities and networks of communities. We have had excellent cooperation with all entities that share that field of crisis intervention, usually the schools, NGOs and some national and local institutions. We are well known to many people, and our work is widely recognized. We remain, however, “invisible” to the highest institutions of the state. We look at it as some sort of “defensive ignorance” which we identify in all place where there is is a fear for established positions, acquired by chance or by merits that are not related in any way or manner to professional competences of ethical standards in a given profession. These are closed circles, and you will see the same people just moving from one position to the other, regardless of the fact that they haven’t completed a single task fully. We try to function on a different set of principles. So far, we could say taht we maintain our independence. We are self-sustainable, we fight constantly for the survival of a whole team of employees and associates, we work on several projects simultaneously, some of which are international projects. For six years now, our main donors are foreign governmetns and foundations. We discovered that we have much better and easier understanding with them then with domestic institutions. Naturally, we work constantly to improve the ability of Macedonian institutions to recognize the need for this type of organizations in terms of community development. |
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