Culture guides for Active Ageing

Interfolk was partner in the Nordplus Adult Development project: "Culture guides for Active Ageing" (GUIDES),  Aug 2013 - July 2015 (24 months).

Key outputs

• HANDBOOK. Culture Guides Activities. 

The partnership circle

included 5 partners from 4 Nordic - Baltic countries, resenting a transnational sum of varied expertise and experiences in the field, which we could not find in just one of the participating countries.

• National Association of Adult Education in Art and Culture (DK)

• Interfolk, Institute for Civil Society (DK)

• Rite Folk High School (LV)

• Tartu Folk High School (EE)

• Estate Academy of Museum Rumsiskes (LT)

Background

Modern welfare states has as a major goal of culture policy to ensure free and equal access to experiences with art and culture for all citizens. Because experiences with art and culture can enliven and enlighten people and change their lives for the better and has positive implications both for the individual and for society.

This complies with the need of all groups of learners, but it will in particular have value for social marginalised groups. Because their marginalisation may imply a retirement from work life as well as lhe community; and they are confronted with the risk of isolation and loss of active relations and engagement. 

It is therefore important that all citizens have the opportunity to participate in art and culture. However, this is not the case. The social groups with a short education and low income, groups marginalised from the work life and some senior citizens are low-users or often non-users of the local art and culture offerings. The reasons may - as it is seen in the report from the Danish Ministry of Culture, "The cultural habits of Danes, 2012" - be many, but it is important that we do something about it.

We therefore see a need to strengthen the access for these vulnerable groups to arts and culture as a gateway to personal development and social inclusion by engaging and retaining them in interesting, culturally active and inclusive environments. Furthermore, we think the most appropriate mean to meet this need and promote ““cultural sustainability” is by using the idea of “citizen help citizen”. The state and municipalities can support such a help, but they cannot do it themselves, neither can the market. It depends on the efforts of volunteers and voluntary arts and culture associations in a civil society context.

We need to find new ways to involve the comprehensive Nordic civil society sector of voluntary arts and culture, where a vast number of cultural and educational associations provide learning activities for about 20 to 30 per cent of the populations. The associations need through cooperation and partnerships with local and cultural actors to create a framework, in which volunteers can convey art and culture at eye level with social marginalised groups in a continuous manner.

The core of such a new framework can be “Culture Guide services”, where the “culture guides” are volunteers that act as mentors or guides by introducing or helping marginalised social groups of seniors to participate in local art and culture activities, either as audience or as active participants.

Aim

The aim is to help social marginalised senior citizens to fell less excluded, gain more self-esteem, experience personal development in order to improve their quality of life. This will be done by developing and promoting new culture guide services in the voluntary arts and culture associations targeting current low- or non-users of art and culture among marginalised social groups, especially with focus on learning for senior citizens.

Such art and culture offerings may include:

• Visits to professional art offerings, provided by local culture institutions or arranged by voluntary arts associations: Theatre, art exhibitions, concerts, dance performances, culture heritage activities, museums, etc.
• Visits or participation in amateur art or voluntary culture activities such as amateur choir, amateur theatre, music groups, dancing groups, telling life stories, local history groups, old handicraft, preservation of cultural heritage places and traditions, etc.

Key activities 

• To develop new methodologies and management skills as well as local training courses for culture guide volunteers;
• To recruit a group of potential volunteers and provide them with the needed training and information;
• To implement a series of pilot work = local culture guide offerings for a selected group of marginalised citizens (seniors);
• To present the results on conferences, on web sides and in a virtual handbook on culture guide activities.

More information

• GUIDES Detailed project plan, after approval

Task plan

First phase: Prepare culture guide activities, Aug 2013 – March 2014

1)  Start-up, prepare tasks to kick-off meeting, present baselines, Aug – Sept 2013

2)  The first 3-days partner meeting, Sept 2013 in Rite, LV

3)  Initiate local pilot works, Oct 2013 – March 2014

Second phase: Implement local culture Guide offerings, April – Dec 2014

4) The Second 3-days partner meeting in Tartu, EE, April 2014 

5) Complete pilot culture guide offerings for marginalised groups, April – Nov 2014

Third phase: Deliver multilateral results, Dec 2014 - June 2015

6) The third 3-days partner meeting, Dec 2014 in Copenhagen, DK

7) Rapport - Provide Handbook on culture guide activities, Jan – March 2015

8) Complete national Conferences, May 2015

All phases: Valorisation, evaluation and project management, Oct 2013 – Dec 2015

9) Dissemination/ exploitation incl. a web portal, Sept 2013 – June 2014

10) Evaluations, Sept 2013 – June 2015

11) Project management Aug 2013 – July 2015