Xêlata DOZ Project – A Dance Journey Through Kurdistan

The Project was funded by The City of Leipzig.

General Information About The Project

Short Description About The Project

The project developed a new dialogue-oriented format to prevent anti-human attitudes and promote tolerance. By learning traditional Kurdish dances with the corresponding music, an intercultural exchange within and outside the Kurdish community in Leipzig was made possible.

The people with refugee experience, who arrived in Germany and thus also in Leipzig, bring their knowledge, their faith and their culture into our society. DOZ e.V. sees itself as a bridge builder and mediator for international understanding. The project Xêlata DOZ was, among other things, about people without migration background to get to know the Kurdish culture and to develop curiosity, as well as intercultural understanding.

Xêlata DOZ means “DOZ’s Gift of Dancing” in Kurdish-Kurmanji. According to this, the dance should strengthen the will for a peaceful coexistence. The folk music and folk dances are part of the Kurdish culture and at the same time very diverse in their form as well as their contents, rhythms, instruments and traditional costumes. We wanted to experience this diversity together through a dancing journey. This is done in the company of musicians from the different regions of Kurdistan.

The project was planned to run from May to December 2019 and was to proceed in seven phases:

• Phase 1: Acquisition of participants (May 2019).)
• Phase 2: Building the group dynamics (June 2019).
• Phase 3: Dances and music from Turkey (June-July 2019).
• Phase 4: Dances and music from Iran (September-October 2019)
• Phase 5: Dances and music from Syria (November-December 2019)
• Phase 6: Closing ceremony (December 2019)
• Phase 7: Evaluation and follow-up (December 2019)

Progress of the Project Xêlata DOZ

After the project was approved by the city of Leipzig on April 5, the distribution of work could take place. Since the coordinator of the pre-project (Kashkol – Leipzig) was otherwise involved due to lack of time capacities, she could not take full responsibility for Ralata DOZ – Xêlata DOZ. As a solution, the work on the project was divided between her and an intern. After the division of work, the organization of the project began and the first steps were taken. This included designing promotional material for the information event and establishing contact with the potential dance teacher for the first phase of the project.

The original plan was to have four phases of the project, each representing a country with Kurdish culture. However, due to difficulties in finding teachers/experts from Iraq/Turkey, we decided to limit the project to only two phases. The trainings took place mainly on Fridays from 17:00 to 19:00 in the VILLA Leipzig (Lessingstraße). Deviating from this, we also trained at times in the Pögehaus Leipzig or danced outside in the park when the weather was nice.

The first phase lasted from 10.05.19 to 28.06.19. Within this phase the participants learned dances and their cultural meaning from the Kurdish regions of Iran and Iraq. The highlight of this was a performance by the dance group at the Stötteritz district festival on 15.06.19. An additionally planned performance at the Multicultural Summer Festival on 30.06.19 in Leipzig unfortunately had to be cancelled due to illness of many group members and unfavorable weather conditions.

After a short break, the second phase began on 07/16/19. This unit included, in addition to the dances, thematically linked lectures from the Kurdish regions of Syria. During this phase, two performances took place in September: The first at the Tanzfest International on 14.09.19 organized by Mühlstraße e.V. and the second as part of the Intercultural Weeks on 15.19.19 called Çîrokên Dîlanan (Dance Stories).

Finally, the closing ceremony of the project took place on 29.11.19 at UT Connewitz. The event was organized in cooperation with the Kurdish Film Days 2019, another project of DOZ e.V.. In this context, the evening included dance performances and live concerts by Kurdish musicians, as well as a film screening. The concerts consisted of traditional live music, a davul (big drum) as well as a zirnê (flute). The typical Kurdish music performance delighted the audience. The dancers were dressed in traditional costumes during the performances, which were specially ordered from Iran. In total, more than 150 people of different origins and ages came together to spend a common evening in a unique, intercultural environment.

Activities Implemented Under This Project

Information Event

Training Sessions – First Phase

Performance: Stötteritz Summer District Festival

Training Sessions – Second Phase

Performance: International Dance Festival (TanzhausFolk e.V and Mühlstraße 14 e.V)

Perfromance: Çîrokên Dîlanan – Dance Stories

Closing Ceremonyr: Xêlata DOZ Soliparty

The Media Work

The media work had two focal points: On the one hand, advertising for and reporting on the project. On the other hand, strengthening the social media skills of the project coordinators. For the first time within this project, the Leipzig designer Aditi Singh was involved in the creation of advertising material.

Tasks Done

– Management of a Whatsapp group with the participants

– Management of Xêlata events (trainings and performances) on Facebook.

– Realization of a countdown video action on Facebook in the run-up to the graduation ceremony.

– Creation of photo and video recordings during trainings and performances.

– 2 flyers were developed: One for the info session/acquisition of participants, another for the graduation ceremony.

– 3 posters were created: One for the event “Dance Stories“ and two for the closing ceremony.

–  Articles have been posted on our website.

Evaluation of The Project

Indicator 1: Regular participation in the entire project

At the information event on 04.05.2019 nine participants took part, almost all of them already had experience from the preliminary project. The interested parties present there later formed our core group for the first project phase. At almost every following training there was an average of 7 participants. At the first performance in Stötteritz 10 people took part, this meant an increase of 3 new participants for our group.

The second phase was unfortunately characterized by a lower number of participants of 4-7 dancers. This was possibly due to the fact that: 1. people saw the first performance as the ‘end of the project’ 2. many people were on vacation in the summer and therefore not in Leipzig 3. the break of 4 weeks between phase 1 and 2 was too long. At the following Tanzfest International finally 6 dancers took part. It consisted of the core group of boys from Syria and a French woman. At the performance ‘Dance Stories’ the next day, 7 dancers were present. However, the group generally consisted mainly of DOZ e.V. employees and their colleagues.

The low number of participants persisted in the following weeks. October, however, meant an upswing in this respect. Our group received growth through contact and exchange with the ‘Dabkeh’ dance group from Leipzig. As a result, our trainings were usually attended by 8 to 11 participants. Finally, 8 dancers performed on the stage of the closing ceremony, as some spontaneously dropped out due to illness.

Indicator 2: Success of the Closing Ceremony

On Friday, November 29, 2019, the Xêlata DOZ Soliparty took place at UT Connewitz.

With lots of music, dance and song, Kurdish culture was celebrated together. Together with our Kurdish Film Days team, we organized the evening together with musicians and dancers.

At 18:30 the evening started with the screening of the film ‘Saz – The Key of Trust’ as part of the Kurdish Film Days. About 40 spectators came for this. After that there was the first music performance, a Saz concert by the musician Amjad Bakir.

Matching the musical mood followed the demonstration of traditional dances from the Kurdish regions of Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria. Our Xêlata DOZ dance group showed the audience impressively what they had practiced in the past 6 months with their teachers Hanieh and Azad in different dance styles. So they presented in the first performance the dances Garian, Chapi I and II and in the following performances Dû gavi, Cherani, Hallay and Bagiyê.

The dance performances were interspersed with a live concert by the Kurd Band. As a highlight of the evening, a Kurdish dance from the regions of Syria was rehearsed together with the audience and later danced together in a large group. During the evening Amaar from Bisto Syria provided us with delicious delicacies.

The crowning finale was the DJ set by DJane Workalot, the Oriental Disco! Together, all of the approximately 150 participants were able to shake a leg and let the successful evening end in a great and happy mood.

It was a successful and unforgettable evening.

Indicator 3: Participant satisfaction questionnaire

We created a questionnaire and forwarded it to our participants. In December 2019, project participants answered the survey. All of them responded positively to the first question, “Did the project bring you closer to Kurdish culture?”, which demonstrated for us a very positive sign of the project’s success.

Here are the other answers.

Lessons Learned from The Project

a) Challenges in The Project

– Obstacles in acquiring musicians in the field of Kurdish traditional music. A long-term involvement of the musicians for the trainings was difficult to realize, since only the interest in the participation in performances existed from this side.

–  A lack of commitment and at times poor communication led to unreliability on the part of the artists. For example, the musicians were constantly late for events.

– Lengthy process in acquiring dance teachers/experts from Kurdistan Turkey and Iraq.

– Difficulty in acquiring women of Kurdish origin. Increased participation of Kurdish men as well as women from non-Kurdish cultural backgrounds.

– In terms of finances, rescheduling/rededication was necessary. Internal difficulties arose from the management in terms of team organization in financial matters. As a result, our DOZ finance department organized a workshop on the subject. The experience resulted in the realization to pay more attention to finances in future projects as well as to involve them more directly from the beginning.

– The fact that we are a non-profit association and therefore depend on donations was not communicated clearly enough during the project and especially during the performances. In some cases, we did not even think about taking measures in this direction, such as the complete provision of a donation box at the events.

– The internal sensitivity between the participants of the dance group has sometimes led to problematic situations. It is important for the organizers to become more familiar with dealing as well as mediating between different personal views.

b) Positive Findings

– The trainings and the events were well attended and showed the interest in Kurdish culture.

– Expansion of our network of dancers, musicians, cultural associations and training venues.

– Increase of the internet presence for the project, especially on Facebook and the DOZ e.V. website, as well as generally much spread information of our events

– We were invited several times to perform at intercultural events: Buntega, Syrian Culture Days, Multicultural Summer Festival, Stötteritz District Festival. This means that our group has become better known in Leipzig circles.

– The communication with the city worked very well.

– Targeted reduction of prejudices through the equal image of women and men in Kurdish dance.

– All those who filled in the questionnaire (9 people) want to continue, which is a sign of the usefulness of the project.

– The cooperation organized by us between the project Ralata- DOZ – Xêlata DOZ. and the Kurdish Film Days was carried out this way for the first time this year and turned out to be a great success. Further cooperation in the future would be desirable and enriching for our structure.

– A good cooperation with our main training place, the Villa e.V., was established.

c) Improvement Opportunities

– More exchange with local Kurdish communities (pay more attention to cultural sensitivity).

– More exchange with other folklore dance groups

– Earlier involvement of the finance department

– In terms of internal financial procedures as well as in dealing with borrowed items, we could observe improvements in the team.

– In order to attract participants more easily, more PR should be done in advance.

– Pay more attention to punctuality at performances

The End