Cafesociety.org spent 5 years working with schools and young people on several of the Native American reservations in Arizona. Here is a selection of those Films made during Cafesociety.org digital workshops with young people on the Navajo , Hopi and Gila River Indian Community reservations. [1998 - 2003].
 

Our largest project to date on the reservation was REZ02 and invloved 8 creative practitioners visiting Arizona to hold a series of new media workshops with young people.

On July 18th 2002, a crew of 8 digital artists made their way from the UK and Holland to Arizona, USA to create a series of digital stories working with a selection of native american and rurally isolated young people.

Firstly we aimed to deliver a language and culture based multimedia project, showing students how to use film making equipment, web design, photography and computer animation to tell a story. 

The project explored Language Ecology which is the preservation of linguistic and cultural diversity. By using multimedia and film making projects we equipped the young people with new skills to record and preserve their own heritage and stories. 

The second goal of the project was to open up discussion with teaching staff from schools in Arizona to the possibility of future ways of collaboratively working and developing online curriculum projects and materials with schools in the Withernsea and South Holderness region of England.

We believe in the necessity for the preservation and celebration of all voices and if the youth are empowered with the skills to use modern day communications technologies, they can continue to speak out in their own voices, protecting and promoting their own cultures as they see fit.

Successes
The crew ran through the equipment list check and the kids were given a how to handle equipment tutorial. No equipment breaks today.

Project development:

Words project ‘Happiness is..’: The crew worked with small groups of kids in rotation; Annabel focused on editing the images, Murray began on the soundtrack (incorporating the words being spoken), Gill worked on the graphics for the credits.

Web site: Jon and Felix continued working on web site development.

Interview techniques: Nirit began working on interviewing techniques with kids.

Diary and research: Lucy wrote the diary from the first few days, floated between the kids listened to them telling her stories. About their music, their dances and their culture.

Basketball: After Lunch the crews idea that the kids organise a basketball match which would involve preparing all the promotional material and making a film about basketball, was presented to them. They liked it.

Gill began working with Kayla and Trisha on the graphic design for the flyers and t-shirts for the teams. The girls had strong ideas about using traditional design, and symbols from Hopi and Navajo cultures; Murray began working on a soundtrack for the film with student Derek leading the inspiration; Nirit began creating the film with students Bobby, Leandre and LaTonya filming and interviewing; Annabel focused on the editing with Bobby; teacher / student Ramson began researching the history of Basketball in the Hopi culture. Lucy helped with research / inspiration for the graphic design and sound.

The heat: the computer room is given an extra fan. Crew in the conference room are grateful for small mercies.

Crew impressions of the kids so far:

Noisy (Murray); Vibrant (Ray); Absolutely amazing (Annabel); Wicked (Gill); Beautiful (Jon); Future (Felix); Inspiring (Lucy)

I believe the children are our future, teach them well & let them lead the way, quote from Ms Whitney Huston, from Nirit.

Back at Base:

Chinese flavours: A tired but inspired crew arrived back home. Murray, Annabel, Gill and Ray went to eat at a Chinese restaurant on the Navajo reservation. All reservation businesses must be Navajo owned, but there really was a Chinese cook there. Perhaps they are married to a Navajo, the food was exquisite.

Wrestling, fried bread & books.

Jon, Felix, Nirit and Lucy gratefully accepted an invitation to Marci’s house. Fried bread and beef stew awaited us. Jon is a vegetarian, but that didn’t matter. The star of the evening was the fried bread. Excellent.

Nirit wants to make a short film piece about this special dish. Marci’s son Dorian wrestled with Felix. Not sure Felix was actually winning that one. Afterwards he treated us to his Scottish accent. (Seems this Scottish theme keeps coming back at us.. firstly the chance encounter at Monument Valley, Murray’s highway drive, Marci and Dorian’s obsession ). Marci and Dorian dream of going to Scotland one day. Lucy was happy with Marci’s books of stories. Jon fell asleep on the sofa.

Breaking the ice: We were amazed with the kids. So well behaved, shy at first but the first icebreaker soon did it did the job and broke the ice as teams competed to build the highest structure out of newspaper.. ‘ last one standing wins’. Ray led the winning team with his physics. Following this, the kids began to open up, by the end of the day it was obvious we wouldn’t need any more ice breakers. Breaks were taken playing basketball on the indoor court at various points in the day. The kids were energised, the crew, slightly less so.

Pleased inspectors: The sight of the kids exploring the tools impressed the project director from the Moenkopi youth project and a group of visiting Gates Foundation people who fund the equipment at the centre.

Projects completed:

Pictorial intros: Polaroid’s were taken and put onto the white board. Each crew member and kid went onto the board with their names.

Hands on: A series of panoramic pictures around and about the centre were taken by the kids under the guidance of Nirit.

Word play: A playful exploration into the Hopi language and everyone’s defining characteristics got underway as each crew member and kid told the group what ‘Happiness is’ in one word. Everyone then wrote their word on a piece of paper, English one side, Hopi the other and presented their words to the camera. The crew then guided the kids to take the filmed images through to a finished piece. Basically, using word play to introduce all aspects of digital media production; concept, filming, sound design.

Things to work on
A Nikon Coolpix 5000 and a JVC dvcam were broken, so giving the kids a ‘how to handle equipment’ tutorial becomes priority for tomorrow.

Added diligence to the supervision of the kit at all times is re-enforced amongst the crew.

The heat: the computer room is actually a cunningly disguised sauna. No air conditioning but we do have one small fan.

Back at base:
Crew meeting >>
A project meeting was held to review the day and tighten the project planning for the rest of the week. Based on what was learnt about the kids today, the group decide to see if the kids want to involve their love of basketball within their exploration of their own language. There will be a basketball tournament, with the kids creating the promotional materials, the soundtrack and a short film about basketball.

Navajo traditions

Gill, Murray and Annabel drove through to the Wallmart at Flagstaff for essential technical supplies. We’re glad they’re back, following their experience with large trucks happily sitting in the middle of the road. All obstacles were neatly avoided by Murray who was combating a day of intense work and heat by envisaging points in the landscape as looking mysteriously like the Scottish highlands, thus proving the power of the mind over matter, as that Scottish breeze kept him alert.

Meanwhile back on the Rez, Jon, Nirit, Lucy and Felix listened to Navajo tales of witchcraft. The spoken words were recorded, but, no images. To protect the anonymity of the individual, their voice will be disguised.