Project Title: NESB Youth Hip Hop Project
Location: Macarthur Diversity Services, Campbelltown, NSW
Community Based Project

Project Details  
The Campbelltown Hip Hop Project was born of the need to find suitable and exciting ways to engage the cultural and linguistically diverse youth in the Macarthur region. Funded by the Australian Council for the Arts, the project began with numerous information forums to discuss with young people what they’d like to see and experience in youth based programs. These sessions identified the sub-culture of Hip Hop as holding great importance to non-English speaking background youth, and Macarthur Diversity Services (formerly Macarthur Migrant Resource Centre) deemed this medium the best way to engage this target group and set about making Hip-Hop the focus of the program.

Hip-Hop is the street culture born of the Bronx in New York City during the 1970s. The movement grew into four clearly defined practices, DJing, MCing, or rapping B-Boying or breakdancing, and finally Graffiti, the art of displaying style and identity through putting up your name.

By having such clearly defined practices, Macarthur Diversity Services consulted with facilitators skilled in these art forms to conceive activities which indirectly addressed issues of health, welfare, employment, and importantly, self identity. Activities such as lyric writing, for example, allowed the worker to explore these themes, as the group were lead to brainstorm song topics and content relevant to their own experiences and feelings.

As motivation, the groups worked towards crafting their very own Hip-Hop CD and Video, and to perform their material at grand final show held for their families and the general public - all goals which, when handled correctly, directly serve as means to empower and motivate the youth involved.

The program attracted participants ranging from school kids, to Juvenile Justice clients and youth from the general public, exposing many of them for the first time to the youth services offered in Macarthur.

While Hip Hop may not always be the popular movement to use as a theme, Macarthur Diversity Services took simple steps to clearly define a driving force amongst youth at that time, and conceive practical ways to apply that force while still addressing the issues that will always affect young people.

Contact: NESB Youth Support Officer
Macarthur Diversity Services
PO Box 525, Campbelltown NSW 2560
Ph:  (02) 4627 1188

Project Title: Harmony Day 2002
Location: Contact Inc, Brisbane, Qld
Community Based Project

Project Details 
Celebrated on March 21, Harmony Day provides an opportunity for all Australians to celebrate Australian multiculturalism. The Department of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA) and Multicultural Affairs Queensland (MAQ) jointly fund Harmony Day. 2002 was the fourth celebration of Harmony Day with a specific focus on young people.

Approximately 90 culturally and linguistically diverse students from years 8-12 from a range of schools in the south-east Queensland area all gathered together on Harmony Day to discuss racism, its affect upon the community and ideas and strategies to combat this. Teachers, arts workers, and government and community organisation representatives also attended the day.  Participants worked together as a whole and in small groups to discuss racism and peace building and together with artsworkers developed creative, strategic and innovative ideas to work toward peace in our communities.

The participants engaged with a variety of culturally appropriate (youth culture(s)) arts based activities including traditional Indigenous and Polynesian dance, contemporary dance, mc-ing, singing and song writing, visual art, story telling and comedy. These activities focused directly upon:

• What is racism?
• Exploring racism within your community e.g. Have I ever experienced it? Have I ever witnessed it? How does this make me feel?
• Strategies and interventions to promote harmony and combat racism within your community e.g. what can I do about racism and how can I promote harmony?

Participants were supported and encouraged to report back to their communities (school, cultural, sporting etc,) to share and continue the ideas that were generated throughout the day.

Participants and artsworkers worked together in small groups to discuss and develop ideas and strategies for peace building. These ideas were presented to the larger group and invited guests in a performative context.

CONTACT INC developed the program in consultation with Multicultural Affairs Queensland, Harmony Day facilitator Chris Pye and the Harmony Day Steering Group.

The program was designed to:

• Create a sense of empowerment and ownership with regards to promotion of harmony within each young person’s community
• Create a safe and meaningful place where young people can meet to exchange and develop ideas
• Encourage understanding of cultural distinctions and difference
• To respect young peoples’ rights, ideas and contributions as young people
• To use appropriate art forms to engage each participant’s needs and interests

Particular attention was paid to the following points:

• Ensuring that the running of the day worked in fairly closely with school times i.e. morning tea and lunch and start and finish times
• Balancing informative sessions with participatory sessions
• Providing a wide variety of creative materials for stimuli i.e. musical instruments, art supplies and costumes
• Dedicated times for morning tea and lunch that allowed for young people to meet and mingle with each other
• FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN FUN

These are artsworkers’ key observations from the day:

• A common theme was that young people are often afraid to talk to other young people from culturally and linguistically diverse as they are concerned that they do not know how to approach them and that they might been seen as racist
• Violence was often a solution to racism – "he was racist to her so I hit him". When this was discussed most participants agreed that this was not a productive way to deal with the issue but had few ideas about how this could be changed
• A "chain reaction" concept: days like Harmony Day spark ideas, these ideas are exchanged between people and like a chain reaction have a long life span
• "From little things big things grow": little things like acknowledging people and treating people as you would like to be treated can lead to better relationships between people
• Media: media influences the way that people perceive the world around them and it is important that the media begin to report things more accurately
• Sometimes it is important to challenge racist behaviour in a constructive manner 
• Days like Harmony Day are incredibly valuable as they provide opportunities for young people from very different backgrounds to meet, talk and share with each other 
• Information, information, information: appropriate, constructive and interesting information is essential for young people to participate in peace building 
• Personal contact and personal stories are the most effective ways of challenging racist behaviour and creating connections between young people 

Contact: Contact Inc
Level 1,301 Brunswick St
PO Box 878
Fortitude Valley Q 4006
Ph:  07 3257 2211
Email: info@contact.org.au
Web:  www.contact.org.au