Yuva Halchal
“This is the first time I came across a youth bulletin which is so
different. Most other bulletins for
youth cover issues like fashion, film, modern living, etc. What we really need is that youth try to
understand their own importance and plan their life accordingly. I feel Yuva Hlachal will provide a direction
for this.”
-Kamlesh
Sharma, Student
Badagaon,
Udaipur, Rajasthan
Yuva Halchal[1]
is a monthly publication of youth ideas, reflections and perspectives developed
and produced by youth through Shikshantar. It is a medium for encouraging,
envisioning, creating and nurturing self-awareness through expression born of
personal experiences and discovery. It
is a venue for dialogue, writing, critique, discussion and networking with other
youth. The goal is to foster an
organic, creative space for expression that grows as youth seek further
conversations, dialogues, etc. among themselves and in Udaipur.
The name Yuva Halchal is
significant in that it reflects the energy of change that the youth founders
wanted to explore and advance. The
purpose of a ‘commotion’ or ‘shake up’ was to challenge and inspire youth to
look at the ways in which they were learning in school, to branch out and
experiment with new ways of interacting and thinking and to see their actions
as a larger process of change. YH participant, Dilip, explains from his
perspective, “We wanted to do something new. When you do something new, you are
automatically changing something. It is
like tossing a stone into a pond – the ripples are inevitable.” Doing ‘something new’ also reflects the
challenge of self-vision and -creation.
Yuva Halchal defies a common ‘implementor’ mindset, in which youth join
an activity or do a project but are still following the directions, ideas or
paths set out by older ‘leaders’. Youth
are in charge of all aspects of Yuva Halchal; it is based on their personal
visions and grows with their own efforts.
As a monthly publication, Yuva
Halchal has included topics of globalization, politics, resistance movements,
nationalism, consumerism, etc. But the
publication is not thematic; there is no superior force that dictates
assignments. Youth chose a topic or
experience and write about it – from their own perspective. In writing from personal
experience, youth are developing their abilities to reflect on personal
opinions and assumptions, rather than living by the word of outside mass-media
or regurgitating sterile information. The meaning of ‘Personal Experience’
takes many forms – personal journeys or discoveries, burning questions,
conversations, research, etc. What is
important is that a person takes responsibility – to know what they believe, to
stand for something, to see places in their life where they can change and
grow. “If you are going to write about
something in the media, put it into the context of your own life,” says Ajay, a
YH youth and Shikshantar Learning Activist. “We need to have more faith in
ourselves and less dependence on the information from TV, the news, etc.”
Contributing to YH is not
limited to writing; there is an open invitation to share and discuss ideas and
questions, create cartoons, songs and poems, edit and proofread articles, and
research topics. Organized discussion groups have also been irregular and
adjunct parts of YH. The point is for
youth to get involved and intrinsically motivated through personal initiative –
to talk to people, question, think, engage others – to make it a life-learning. YH does not seek to be a wide-spread
‘mega-magazine’, but rather a collection of highly motivated, local individuals
who chose to take part. By sharing
their work, they encourage people in other places to start their own local
magazine or media project, in the context of their own visions and ideas. Youth have written from Kerala, Maharashtra
and other parts of Rajasthan, to say that they are experimenting with their own
youth projects, and have been inspired by Yuva Halchal.
Getting youth to
participate (and continue to participate) is not an easy endeavor,
however. In making the effort to
transcend a school framework that has stifled their creativity and
self-expression, youth come up against many challenges and frustrations that
are directly linked to their experiences within this framework. They are accustomed
to copying essays and other work, not writing original pieces or taking a
personal stance. Disturbingly, many college graduates cannot formulate or
express their ideas in writing. The
concept and process of discussion, critique and revision can be
intimidating. Many youth have an ego
about revision; they may write a piece but refuse to discuss it further. Or they think that writing from an objective
position, using big words and abstract ideas will ‘pass’, as though they are
writing for teacher. Engaging in
self-critique and reflection during the writing process is an important part of
Yuva Halchal, as is learning to give constructive feedback to others. From these experiences and interactions,
youth have the opportunity to develop their own style. Because of these challenges, YH
participation fluctuates and evolves. It is a dynamic, self-organizing unit;
sometimes there are 15 youth involved, sometimes only two.
Distribution
YH is distributed in and
around Udaipur and to approximately 40 organizations and youth movements
throughout India. YH participants also experiment with personal distribution,
in which each gives the publication to five people, with the expectation that
they discuss it together later. In this
way, there is a chance for true engagement about the work, further generation
of ideas and feedback and an expanded space for realization of community
expression and creative learning. The strength of Yuva Halchal lies in the
direct, personal interactions and efforts of youth here in Udaipur now.
Yuva Halchal also finds
inspiration through similar visions and youth actions in other places. One is with Qalb el-Umour, a youth
publication through the Arab Education Forum.[2] QU is a space for youth to express and
reflect on their ideas, create networks, dialogue, learn – using material they
already have: their own life experiences. The way in which the forum and
publication work and the principles and values that they embrace, while
specific in purpose, setting and experiences to the community from which it is
created, are also closely in line with and have helped further the
conceptualization process of Yuva Halchal.
Some of the main Qalb
el-Umour points that resonated with conceptual goals of Yuva Halchal:[3]
·
My life is the object of my reflections and expressions…and
my reflections and expressions are the basis of my learning.
·
Life is made of people’s stories; not atoms. Life and
experience are the basic elements in learning.
·
People’s lives and experiences are transformed into
“stories” and understood through contemplation, reflection, expression and
dialogue. Reflection is crucial in
learning because it necessarily connects thought to action and context.
·
Learning, like breathing, can only happen inside and
outside human beings as parts of one holistic process, i.e., learning cannot
take place solely inside nor solely outside her/him.
·
Start the building process with what exists and what is
inspiring (and not with needs and what is negative or lacking nor with ready
answers, models or solutions).
·
Knowledge is constructed collectively, through interaction
with the natural-social-political-economic-cultural environment in which people
live, and through conversation, reading and dialogue.
By writing from self-experience
and engaging in new forms of expression and engagement, youth are both
participating in and creating a powerful, “new” process of thinking and space
for learning. This provides stimulus
for deeper questioning – about how we
think, how we understand. This is a
challenge for individuals – it requires going out on a limb, taking a stand,
exposing personal values, making oneself vulnerable. On another level, by taking the challenge, youth are engaging in
a process of “un-schooling” whereby they are breaking down an infiltrated
factory school mind-frame. It is this
mind-frame and through this model of schooling that such insecurity and
paralysis surrounding personal expression is created. Most importantly, Ajay emphasizes, it is an opportunity to make
the links between reflecting, writing and taking action. “Many people can talk about how the world
should be better, but the point is to focus on doing, taking an active role.” Yuva Halchal provides a valuable space for
getting motivated and breaking from the paralysis.
Working on Yuva Halchal is a
forum for youth to discuss real-life experiences. It also creates opportunities for learning real life-skills. One
skill is research. Youth explore their
own experiences through writing, but also develop valuable interviewing skills
(communication skills, interpersonal skills, synthesizing information). The interviewing process has been a good way
for youth to gain diverse perspectives and deepen their understandings about
many issues.
Another part of the writing
process is learning to use the computer in a practical way. Expensive computer courses have become very
popular in India, but the point of these classes has been limited to complex
programming languages, without any focus on application. While youth can speak the complex
programming jargon and memorize codes and equations, they cannot apply this
information to their daily lives or use it in innovative ways. By learning to use the computer for writing
and publishing as a part of Yuva Halchal, it becomes a real tool with a
meaningful purpose.
[1] Yuva Halchal translates roughly into ‘Youth Commotion’. Halchal connotes a shake-up or movement.
[2] The Arab Education Forum is sponsered by the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. For more details and elaboration, see Munir Fasheh’s article, ‘From the Soils of Culture: The Qalb el-Umour Project in the Arab World’, 2001, Vimukt Shiksha: Special Issue: Unfolding Learning Societies: Deepening the Dialogues, Shikshantar.
[3] Ibid: Taken from “Principles, Convictions and Values that Govern the Thinking and Work of Qual el-Umour”