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While the importance of calling attention to the social consequences of a Digital Divide cannot be over emphasized, the call to alarm should not tarnish, nor diminish the socio-cultural possibility of inclusiveness made possible by digital technologies. The challenge for cultural institutions and the private sector alike is to provide opportunities that allow diverse groups of people to become active producers of products and processes that contribute to the quality of their own lives. This requires a shift from viewing potential audiences as groups of passive consumers and necessitates creating approaches that encourage targeted audiences to take an active part in the design of products and services tailored to individual and community needs.
Since 1997 New Liberty Productions, a 23-year-old non-profit media production center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania has worked with digital technologies and collaborative teaching/learning strategies and techniques to create enriching cultural narratives in after school programs, summer camps and middle schools. The endeavor known as The Children's Cultural Awareness Animation Project (CCAAP) makes use of drawing, storytelling and song. Participants scan their drawings into computers and create narratives that are animated and embellished with their own voices. We have worked with groups of Southeast Asian, African American and Latino children; the groups selected did not have prior meaningful access to digital technologies. The techniques we used familiarized children with the power of computers as production tools, rather than as mere instruments of consumption. This type of orientation opens up many teaching/learning possibilities and perhaps even foreshadows the way 21st century democratic societies may disseminate information and knowledge, and create opportunities, wealth and prosperity. With these possibilities in mind, New Liberty began its first commercial application of CCAAP strategies and techniques in a collaborative project with SEPTA, the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transit Authority and 125 school age children living in West Philadelphia. SEPTA is tearing down a 100 year old elevated subway line and is building a new one in its place. SEPTA is concerned that children living along the route not regard the construction site as a playground. New Liberty worked with its client, SEPTA to engage West Philadelphia youths in the creation of a public safety message targeting an audience of 6-12 year olds that live in neighborhoods serviced by the elevated subway. The animation produced warns of the dangers and offers guidelines for staying safe during the construction process. New Liberty is currently working with Women Organized Against Rape to produce a computer animation to raise awareness about sexual abuse among children 4 to 7 years old. Sexual abuse of children by adults is a social problem that is attracting much adult attention. The new work will raise awareness about sexual abuse and offer strategies for avoidance to young audiences.
The proposed presentation for the BKK will include excepts from completed works, and will discuss outcomes, and possibilities for using the model developed in the Children's Cultural Awareness and Animation Project in future ventures and learning environments.