Small Wars Journal

Dialogue in Nigeria: Muslims & Christians Creating Their Future

Fri, 01/20/2012 - 1:32pm

In Dec 2010, we introduced the SWJ community to Libby and Len Trauman who were beginning the process of forming a dialogue in Nigeria, a non-military, non-state peacemaking through dialogue.  Defining "We" not "Us" versus "Them."

 

Dialogue in Nigeria
Muslims & Christians Creating Their Future

Posted with permission from the authors

This hopeful documentary gives voices and faces to 200 courageous Muslims and Christians – diverse young women and men – who unite successfully in Jos, central Nigeria.

Refusing to be enemies, they are together during days and evenings of the 2010 International Conference on Youth and Interfaith Communication.

They are tense yet excited to finally cross lines of religion, economics, tribe, and gender to transcend the status quo and discover empathy for each other's personal life experiences.

Together they realize that "an enemy is one whose story we have not heard," while listening-to-learn and thus dignifying themselves and the "others."

Face to face and in small circles, they begin with ice-breakers and continue in depth to discover one another's equal humanity – fear, grief, needs, hopes, and concrete plans for a shared future.

These determined young Nigerians illustrate how others worldwide can successfully connect and communicate to create authentic community.

 

Request DVD:
 

                        DIALOGUE IN NIGERIA
                                                   at
                      http://traubman.igc.org/vidnigeria.htm

 

DESCRIPTION:   
Two hundred courageous Christian and Muslim young adults met in face-to-face Dialogue,
listening to learn and discovering their equal humanity, new communication skills, and that
"an enemy is one whose story we have not heard."

A 2012 film by the
New Era Educational and Charitable Support Foundation
Jos, Plateau State, Nigeria
&
Jewish-Palestinian Living Room Dialogue Group
San Mateo, California, USA

Comments

KingJaja

Sun, 01/22/2012 - 1:48pm

Sadly, there are deep,underlying political problems that underpin these tensions and these photo-ops (for all their benefits) will not address them.

I speak as a Nigerian, conversant with that part of the country.

These tensions started in the early nineties, and they were in response to the creation of local councils, the problems of indigene vs settler and evangelical Christianity vs fundamentalist Islam.

Hubba Bubba

Sat, 01/21/2012 - 12:37am

an interesting aspect of swarm theory in action...crowd-sourcing; social movements in the digital era.