Above: A proud film crew makes their way through San Francisco’s agricultural land. The workshop and film project were more successful than any of us at Village Earth ever dreamed possible. The Shipibo have an increased sense of hope of achieving their collective vision for the future. Future collaboration is already being planned with Village Earth, the Inti Wayna Foundation, and Engineers Without Borders. And now the Shipibo have a documentary film that they can use internally amongst themselves as an educational tool, and also as a fundraising tool to sell to tourists or send to funding agencies. And this whole project was done with an extremely low budget with the help of many volunteers who made it possible. Now that the workshop participants have returned home, they have begun to work with their individual communities to collectively decide on their strategic directions for the future. As well many horizontal linkages were created amongst the participants and their communities, and also between the Shipibo and these other resource organizations. As well, this workshop helped to foster greater collaboration amongst NGOs working in the area. Overall, the workshop has been deemed a success by all involved.
Spring II Session
GSLL 1517 – Community-Based Organizing
Taking a practical “hands-on” perspective, this course will explore the theories, tools, styles and challenges of community-based organizing. It will discuss practical strategies for developing community leadership and working with marginalized communities, exploring the ideas and examples from Evo Morales, Paulo Freire, Saul Alinsky, Sub-Comandante Marcos, the Bridge Immigrant Rights experiment and Martin Heidegger.
