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United Arab Emirates Palestine: Street performance sheds light on discrimination against Bedouins
August 4, 2016
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Theatre Day Productions, the implementing body of Drama, Diversity and Development’s ‘Young Stories of Bedouin Life and Prejudice’ project, has been performing “In the Rectangle of Doubt” in Gaza since August 1. This play aims to shed light on the discrimination and stigmatisation faced by the community of Um Al Nasser Bedouin village in North Gaza. The performance follows a Bedouin called Salem as he grows up in a place that appears to be cut off from the rest of society.
The performance brings together various theatre styles, combining epic theatrical techniques with elements of farce. In addition, the performance integrates different musical effects, such as desert sounds and the rhythms of the Bedouin “Dahiyya” folk dance.
The story presents Salem, a young boy growing up in Umm El Nasser village. When Salem is six years old, he makes his first trip out of the village to register for school. He starts slowly discovering the “other” world outside his village and experiencing people’s attitudes towards him as a Bedouin. This story reflects the realities faced by Umm El Nasser Bedouins in Gazan society.
Drama, Diversity and Development is the first grant project in culture funded under the regional programme “Media and Culture for Development in the Southern Mediterranean Region Programme”. DDD then sub-grants to smaller projects, towards its aim of promoting diversity and challenging discrimination against minorities through theatre.
Media and culture for development in the Southern Mediterranean has been allocated a total budget of €17 million over a four-year period, of which €9 million is for the award of grants on a co-financing basis, and €8 million for one capacity-development mechanism on media (MedMedia) and one capacity development mechanism on culture (MedCulture). Specifically, the programme seeks to reinforce the role of media and culture as vectors for democratisation, and economic and social development for societies in the Southern Mediterranean. In the cultural field, it supports activities fostering cultural policy reform and reinforcing the capacity of cultural policy makers, as well as promoting investment and the development of cultural operators’ business capabilities. (EU Neighbourhood Info)
Read more
“Drama, Diversity and Development” (DDD) webpage
Med Culture web page
Media and Culture for Development in the Southern Mediterranean Region Programme – project fiche
EU Neighbourhood Info Centre – Culture and media
Countries covered:
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Palestine *
