(en) France, Alternative Libertaire AL dossier spécial sur
l'éducation populaire - Grenoble-La Villeneuve: social pedagogy and
street workshops (fr, it, pt) [machine translation]
The Ms Ruetabaga Association is made up of social workers who are inspired by the
principles of social pedagogy. With their sleigh multi-task they are trying to create in
the street of new social ties linking autonomy, organization and creativity to combine
individual and collective interests. ----------- In Villeneuve, a popular area in the
south of Grenoble, the "street-fighteuse 'association Mrs Ruetabaga foam neighborhood,
rioting hordes of children at the foot of the buildings. It is a movable structure, which
includes weekly its free street workshops and open to everyone unconditionally. Its
various activities (gardening, cooking, visual arts, circus ...) always end with a lunch,
followed by a "board" where are debated future workshops, self-discipline or broader
issues about the neighborhood. ..
These workshops carry "social pedagogy". It does not try to create an ideal educational
environment in the hope of making out an equally ideal society. It is a pedagogy of here
and now, that does not dissociate the environment she works. However, it is a pedagogy of
transformation, and in this sense, it fits well with popular education. Like Paulo Freire
and the Brazilian Movement of Landless, it relies on the appropriation of a common good
and the production / creation. From there emerges the transformation process, which
induces social emancipation as a creative development of the individual.
What we research through workshops, is autonomy (via a collective interdependence to
collective ownership of means of production), organization (testing of a horizontal
collective functioning) and creativity (imagine ways to transform their environment by
overcoming habitual patterns).
An asymmetrical relationship? Exactly
Particular attention is given to human relations. Because of ties, requests will express
themselves, needs to be identified. Small groups will be formed for specific actions
(perform an exhibition, organize a meal to fund stays, write a letter to the town hall
...). Occasionally, specific attention will be given to a family or an individual child
(in an emergency, a need for affection ...). Certainly, it is quite the teacher to be
particularly careful and attentive. The relationship can be asymmetrical, but that is
precisely what creates the movement and turns the middle. Relationships are enriched with
these situations, and in their turn feed the street workshops.
Robin (Grenoble)
http://www.alternativelibertaire.org/?Grenoble-La-Villeneuve-pedagogie
