Conference: History Connects

The Conference “History Connects” is the final event within the project “Interpretation of the History of the modern time”. This event, even though is the last project activity, it is the first event that was implemented live in an open space. On the 27^th of May 2021, at the park of the Youth Cultural Center in Skopje, we gathered together with history teachers, as well as with representatives from civil society organizations, supporters and institutions from our country.

This conference brought together different people and was extremely inspirational. Also, variety of aspects were introduced through which one can interpretate the history. The event was divided in three parts with space for questions, answers and discussions.

“History in eleven quotes” was the expose by Petrus Theunisz, who with inspirational words challenged the audience and the   present to contemplate on few key questions: Is the holocaust really the most difficult theme for discussion? Why the History since the independence of the country does not exist? Is there nothing about 2001? And how is it possible that nothing has changed since 2005 in the history programs?

„In order to get to this stage, there was a long process of work … We work with Peace Action since 2009, through the program Civil Peace Service. For me this is a mosaic. We still do not have the complete picture, but this process is a part of a mosaic. Now, I would like to address You. You will always have someone who will support you, this process will be made according to your needs, and someone will make sure that your voice is heard. We are here to give you a hand and together to design that process” – said Benjamin Blänkner, Regional Coordinator Western Balkans, KURVE Wustrow – Centre for Training and Networking in Nonviolent Action.

In the second part of the Conference, the project achievements were presented. The professors included in the project activities, shared the opinions about the process of capacity building, the dialogue meetings, and the creation of the Handbook for implementation of extracurricular activities for the history subject. These activities were implemented with students representing different ethnic communities gathered from 3 to 4 schools per group. The teachers were working both in primary and secondary schools in 4 groups. The following topics were themes for discussion: Politics is feminine; Women in Macedonia – women heroes, They are also our heroes (the Football Representation) and Multicultural Calendar. In the second part, the findings from the analyses of the History textbooks were also presented.

In the third part of the Conference, we hosted guests from EU countries.  The topics were as following: EU Experiences – Latvia, what is the path to a modern history teaching?- the expose was made by Laura Lauberga – Nikolova – History teacher from Latvia and Steaven Steagears, Director in EUROCLIO who made presentation on the topic Interpretation of the 21^st Century History, challenges for the teachers and lessons learned .

The event is available on the Peace Action Youtube Channel  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHI-0lrNPvQ

Two national TV stations showed interest for the event. Goran Taleski, peace worker in Peace Action was a guest in the morning broadcast on 24 Vesti, and the history teachers gave statements for Sitel TV.