European Lived Culture Connects Erasmus Project

Project Title

European Lived Culture Connects

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for adult education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Creativity and culture; Cultural heritage/European Year of Cultural Heritage

Project Summary

The European Cultural Heritage is a unique melting pot of different cultures. “United in diversity” – that is the declared motto of the EU and a guiding principle of this unique community of nations. At the same time this motto bears a task for all Europeans, to create a synergy of cultures and regard each single culture as a valuable part of the unique community in the context of other cultures.
The EliCCon-project aimed to explore the rich cultural diversity of europe and raise awareness about its high value for our common life. The focus was on the lived cultural heritage: the values, the traditions, customs and habits. The more the people in Europe will learn from each other, the more fears and prejudices against other cultures can be reduced and valuable synergies can arise. Nowadays learning about lived cultures in Europe requires to consider also cultures from non-european countries, that are practised in Europe and the change of cultures in the course of time.
Coordinated by the European Photo Academy from Germany, project teams from the Czech Republic, Spain and the United Kingdom made photo reportages of interesting examples of intangible cultural heritage in their country. A Swiss student of the European Photo Academy rounded off the result with examples of intangible cultural heritage in Switzerland. Altogether 25 photographers were working for two years to document the intangible cultural heritage in their country. 92 photo reportages resulted from the extensive data collection.
The results were presented with exhibitions on interesting public places during the project lifetime: In May 2019 more than 60 exhibits were shown at the University of Huelva in Spain. In July 2019 the EliCCon-Exhibition was presented in the South and City College in Birmingham and in October 2019 the czech project partner organized the exhibition in the Michal Mine, that is a national cultural monument in Ostrava. The exhibition series was concluded with an exhibition in the municipal library in Rastatt. It started in July 2020 and ended in October 2020.
The project partners used the project meetings for an intercultural exchange with lectures and visits to culturally interesting sites.
The project teams conducted four transnational online-conferences, where each project partner presented examples of the intangible culture in his country. The recordings were uploaded on Youtube and remain available for free to all people. The project results were summarized on more than 600 pages in an E-Book (OER) in order to ensure the sustainability of the project, to preserve and disseminate the intangible cultural heritage in Europe.
Many people who actively practise culture were pleased with the documentation of their activity. A feedback from a traditional german brass band sums this up:

“First of all… I would like to congratulate you on this project and the associated e-book.Just a glance at the table of contents and the very first browsing through the many articles and photo reportages show the scope of this project. But it also impressively shows the incredible diversity and wealth of European culture.
Admittedly, it makes us a bit proud to be a small part of it and we feel honoured to be able to stand as an example of the music tradition in our region in this e-book. Many thanks for this!…”

The transnational exchange is of particular value. Because people have a certain idea of strangers, which makes it easier for them to classify others. Such stereotypes are mostly inconsistent with reality. Through the mutual exchange of information about the lived cultural heritage of the respective countries stereotypes can be reduced enormously. The active exchange of cultures through non-formal and informal learning contributes to the growing together of the European states and to the fight against nationalism and xenophobia.
All project partners provided comprehensive experiences and skills for the project. Whereas the german project partner has its focus on adult and further education in the field of photography, digital media, e-learning and intercultural management, the spanish partner is a social enterprise focused on training, innovation and traineeship in digital skills at European level. The partner from UK is a non-governmental organisation that is passionate about improving lives of disadvantaged people in society. They actively engage especially young people through the use of sports, culture and creativity. Their motto is “Ideas into Action”. The mission of the czech project partner is to improve peoples lives through high quality intercultural training, transfer of innovation and lifelong learning. They provide an extensive knowldege about the history of the Moravian-Silesian region. The qualifications and experience of the partners ensured a high quality of the project. All project teams will continue to work on cultural issues after the project. The preservation of cultural heritage is an ongoing task.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 50290 Eur

Project Coordinator

VINC Learning UG (haftungsbeschränkt) & Country: DE

Project Partners

• PRAXIS EUROPE CIC
• ALVIT – inovace a vzdelavani s.r.o.
• INERCIA DIGITAL SL