A Project Turning Frowns Upside Down for Children of War - CircusTalk

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A Project Turning Frowns Upside Down for Children of War

For almost five years now in Turkey’s Southeastern city of Mardin, local and foreign volunteer teachers at the Her Yerde Sanat Derneği (Art Everywhere Foundation) have been organizing circus training and activities to heal children’s war wounds and bring them back into society. At the centre of this is Sirkhane (Circus House), where instructors use what is known as “social circus” as a pedagogical approach. At Sirkhane, they give lessons in circus arts such as juggling, acrobatics, and using stilts, along with classes in other art forms and language.

The name for Sirkhane comes from the Turkish word sirk (circus) plus the word hane/xane/khane, which means “house” in Turkish, Kurdish, and Arabic. The organisers’ greatest dream was to create a place in Mardin where children and young people from different backgrounds could come together in an inclusive space, where there is no discrimination, and where art is the common language of people from different countries, mother tongues, and religions…

Read the Full Article at Ahval News

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