ASF Summer Camp in Berlin-Schöneweide, Germany
"A Short Film on the Topic of Nazi Forced Labour"
21.08-31.08.2023

The summer camp will take place in cooperation with the International Youth Meeting Centre (IYMC) of the Nazi Forced Labour Documentation Centre. It will focus on working with historical sources and making a short film. Thematically, at the core of the project there will be Nazi forced labour and gender.

The International Youth Meeting Centre (IYMC) is part of the Nazi Forced Labour Documentation Centre that is located on the grounds of an almost completely intact former forced labour camp in Berlin Schöneweide. The exhibitions, archives, and educational programmes focus on a forgotten victim group: about 8.4 million civilians from all over Europe (up until 2006 without their own memorial site) were forced to work for the Nazi regime during World War II.

The International Youth Meeting Center opened in 2015 on the grounds of the documentation center. It offers a place where young people from different countries and cultures come together, discuss and learn together. Using the example of the Nazi dictatorship and forced labour, the participants deal with the mechanisms of exclusion and exploitation.

During the summer camp, the participants deal with the life stories of the former forced labourers. Through guided tours, workshops and work with various historical sources - especially biographies and interviews - the participants will gain an insight into the everyday life of the former forced labourers. The structures, organisation and ideology of Nazi forced labour will also be examined. In terms of content and topic, we focus on Nazi forced labour and gender.
In the practical part, the participants learn basics of theater and performance work. Together we will explore scenic realizations for their content-related work regarding forced labor. We will use the site of the Nazi Forced Labour Documentation Centre and the prepared historical sources for the scenes. These scenes will be filmed and will result in a short film that is an artistic/performative representation of the participants' work.

Staged performance work will be enhanced by tours of the Nazi Forced Labour Documentation Center and other historical sites in Berlin.

Work: staged reading/biography work

Group: 14 participants

Language: For this camp a good knowledge of English is required.

Information: http://www.dz-ns-zwangsarbeit.de/ (please do not send inquiries there!)