Know what it means to be poor
Immersions are learning events that
bring you face to face with the
day-to-day lives of the poor. It is
an attempt to bring together people
wanting to end poverty and people
who directly experience it in an
informal and highly personal way.
When you participate in an
immersion, you get an opportunity to
live with a family that belongs to
one of the poorest communities –
dalits, tribals, marginalised
Muslims, people living with HIV, and
sex workers. By staying
with the family and living, as far
as possible, how that family lives,
you directly experience what it
means to be poor.
Immersions help you understand not
only the daily challenges
marginalised communities face but
also their strengths, resilience and
wisdom. The spirit of the immersion
is that you do not go and stay there
as dignitaries, but as fellow human
beings.
Organising immersions
We organise immersion programmes
periodically with the help of our
partner organisations, sometimes
even in
remote rural places. The ActionAid immersion
programmes are far more flexible and
less structured than planned field
visits.
The programme is spread over five
days. The first day our partner
organisation briefs you about the
concerns of the community and their
ways of living and coping. You are
provided with a profile of the host
family and a briefing kit that
comprises a profile of the
community, a map of the locality and
a description of ActionAid's work in
the area.
Activities
This is followed by three days and
three nights of stay with the
family, when you take part in the
everyday activities of the community
members from sowing saplings and
seeds and harvesting crops, to
lighting the cooking hearth and even
making chapattis. Listening to the
life stories of the village families
is key to successful participation.
On the last day the hosts and
participants share their experiences
of the stay.
You are provided with an interpreter
if required. An ActionAid member
well versed with local issues is on
hand during the entire immersion.
Immersions are hosted with the help
of fees collected from participants
like you. Those from outside India
have to pay 900 UK pounds and those
living in India give 25,000 rupees.
Upcoming immersion
|
State |
Community
|
Dates |
|
Orissa |
Indigenous community – Bonda
tribe |
3rd to 7th November 2008 |
If you are interested in taking
part, please contact:
Damodaram Kuppuswami
Soopriti Lall
Sincy Joseph
