The project “Library as a place of human rights education: a textbook for educators and training” is to inspire municipal libraries from small places (of up to 20,000 residents) to start activities in human rights education and provide the substantive and methodological support for such activities. The project’s basic outcome will be an electronic textbook (e-book) available under the CC-BY-SA license. The textbook development structure will be dynamic: an initial version of the publication will be developed prior to librarian’s training and then supplemented on the basis of their comments.

Textbook’s structure
The planned structure of the textbook expected to contain 100 pages.
1. Human rights theory. Introduction to the idea of human rights; presentation of the historical origin of the development of the human rights system (with the main emphasis on the experience of World Ware II and the Holocaust), review of human rights idea in the Polish legislation.

2. Methods of human rights education. Presentation of major human rights education methods with a clear reference to the municipal library potential.

3. Source texts and iconography: 40 source texts and 20 photographs from the history of Poland and her neighbours (in the 20th century) showing the issue of human rights observance and the struggle for their respect from various perspectives. Each text and photograph will be provided with respective historical comments and methodological description of how to use them in the human rights education process (including a proposal of specific exercises based on their analysis).

4. Librarians’ opinions and experiences related to the local library potential as a place of human rights education gathered during the workshops.The source materials from Poland’s 20th century history gathered and edited in the planned textbook may be used as examples - during educational activities and with respect to the present day – for showing the universality and general nature of human rights.

Work on the textbook and making it available online
The initial version of the textbook will be tested and consulted with librarians taking part in the Local Tradition Digital Archives project (four training courses for some 120 librarians from 60 places). This will make it possible to better adjust the textbook’s content to the needs and possibilities of libraries.

The LTDA project consists of developing grass-roots social archives in municipal libraries with a view to saving the local historical heritage. The “History at Hand” competition motivates post-primary school pupils to study the (family, local) close history on one’s own based on professional historical research methods (oral history interviews, criticism of sources, etc.). Human rights-related threads appear naturally in both projects – the developed textbook may be successfully used in both these initiatives.

Modules connected with the human rights theory and education methods will be developed by experts dealing with these issues on a daily basis. Source materials will be based on the KARTA Center’s archival and publishing resources.

Making the textbook available in the form of an e-book under the CC-BY-SA license will definitely expand the project’s area of influence also to libraries which are not taking part in the Local Tradition Digital Archives project, teachers, educators from non-governmental organizations and local activists. The license will make it possible to use part of the textbook to prepare other publications, develop presentations or supplement entries in the largest Internet encyclopaedia – the Wikipedia.

There will be 200 printed versions of the textbook to be distributed among the libraries taking part in the project and selected organizations and institutions engaged in human rights education.

For more information about the project you can ask Marcin Wilkowski: m.wilkowski@karta.org.pl, +48 22 844 10 55. 

The project "Local Library as a place of human rights education: a textbook for educators and training" is being implemented within the TEACHING HUMAN RIGHTS programme with support from the Foundation “Remembrance, Responsibility and Future”.

Photo: The second visit of the Pope Johannes Paul the Second in Poland. On the photo people in Częstochowa welcome the Pope with the banner: Welcome the defender of human rights! Photographer Stanisław Gębczak, collection of the KARTA Center, handed over by Kazimierz Helebrandt. Source: Website Fotohistoria.pl.

(ak)