Last week saw Surrey County FA open their doors to the local community by hosting a Living Library event at the County FA headquarters in Leatherhead.
The event was organised in partnership with Kick It Out, the national discrimination campaign together with Communities for Local Government, based in central London.
The living library is a global initiative which is aimed at developing community cohesion, understanding and encouraging dialogue. It was first launched at a youth festival in Denmark in 2000 and has since become a global phenomenon with events taking place all over the world. This particular event was the first to be held in a sports organisation and proved to be an over whelming success.
In its simple form, the Living Library is a mobile library which is set up as a space for dialogue and interaction. Visitors to the Living Library are given the opportunity to speak informally for 20 minutes with ‘people on loan’; this latter group being extremely varied in age, sex and cultural background.
The Living Library enables groups to break stereotypes by challenging the most common prejudices in a positive and humorous manner. It is a concrete, easily transferable and affordable way of promoting tolerance and understanding.
“The Living Library is a fantastic way for people to develop their understanding of the diversity that lives within their community,” said Oliver Selfe, Senior Football Development Officer and organiser of the event.
“Speaking to a person in a face-to-face conversation is far more powerful than hiring a book from the library and allows people the opportunity to explore different cultures in a friendly, safe environment.
“The theory is that staging these events enables people to ask the questions that they usually wouldn’t get the opportunity to ask. This can have a very powerful effect on changing people’s opinions and stereo typing.”
People who volunteered to become human books and make themselves available for hire included a female referee, a black football coach, a gay manager, a homeless person, an ex-offender and a member of the Surrey gipsy community.
Over 40 people signed up to become a ’reader’ and attend the Surrey Living Library. Tom Brake, MP for Carshalton was one such person and commented: ‘In just 20 minutes, I was absorbed into the different and dark world of Desmond’s experiences in a tough inner-city neighbourhood. Living Books can help create bonds between people with very different life experiences.’
If you wish to find out more about the Living Library visit www.living-library.org
Tuesday, 20 October, 2009