Conference and workshops Games against hate speech

on Saturday the 18th of September 2021

What can be done to prevent our young people from being regularly exposed to online hate speech? While many initiatives have taken up the issue on social media, little has been done in the context of video games, though they are one of the favorite hobbies of young people. And yet it is urgent to act and to create counter- narratives as well as, to encourage game creators to imagine mechanisms that stimulate the knowledge of how to live online together. The Play Your Role project has focused for two years on the of use video games to develop young people’s critical thinking and to help them fight against online hate speech. How does it work? The originality of the project is to use video games as an educational tool to carry out its actions.


A project that provides answers and tools

This event will present the results of the work conducted by German, French, Italian, Lithuanian and Polish partners: a research, a pedagogical toolkit with 15 educational courses based on existing games, games developed within the project…


Who for?

For all the people involved in the fight against online hate speech. Experts in Media Education, institutions, elected officials, video game creators, educational mediators.



Programme

Plenary conference, 11:15 am – 12:30 am
The conference will be held online both in English and French with simultaneous translation

  • Introduction – Media & Information Literacy and hate speech: Divina Frau-Meigs, Professor Sorbonne Nouvelle & President of Savoir Devenir
  • Insights and actions of the national French Observatory on Hate Speech: French TV and radio regulatory body, Carole Bienaime-Besse, Member of the CSA.
  • Presentation of the Play Your Role European project Overall achievements by Silvia Ferreira Mendes, Project manager at Centro Zaffiria, the Media Education Center coordinating the project
  • Focus on research results – CIAC – Centro de Investigaçāo em Artes e Comunicação, University of Algarve, Portugal
  • Virtues of gamification to tackle sensitive issues: Alexis Deschamps, Director of the Film, Animation and Video Games Bachelors at E-Artsup School, Toulouse, Creative Director at Freya Games.
  • The answer of the French Defender of Rights to counter discrimination: George Pau-Langevin, deputy of the French Defender of Rights in charge of the fight against discrimination and the promotion of equality.

International workshops
Let kids fight against hate speech!
2:00 pm – 3:00 pm
4 workshops respectively conducted in French, German, Italian, Lithuanian and Polish dedicated to educational mediators.

  • Workshop 1
    Italian workshop “Hate Speech and Toxicity in Video Games, Chat Rooms and Blogs”, tackling hate speech in the social spheres around video games on the examples of the Play Your Role developed games.
    In this workshop, the two video games Divide et Impera and Among all of us will be presented. They are two examples of gamification to counteract online hate speech by activating teenagers’ skills and bringing the issue to the centre of their gaming practices – Centro Zaffiria (Alessandra Falconi, Zeno Menestrina, Cecilia Piazza) with COSPE. The workshop will be held in Italian.
  • Workshop 2
    Polish workshop: Are we prepared to encounter online hate speech?
    Do we know how to respond to it? Can we recognize a pathological situation quickly enough? It is not always easy. During the workshop, Fundacja Nowoczesna Polska will present to teachers and educators pedagogical itineraries and we will try them out in practice. The goal is to try to prepare young people for various types of difficult communication situations related to one of the most important forms of cultural activity – computer games. The workshop will be held in Polish.
  • Workshop 3
    German workshop: Experiencing and tackling Hate Speech
    How does it feel to be discriminated against? In this workshop JFF-Institute for Media Education will present the interactive blog-game Among all of us and a virtual Minetest world designed for groups to experience discrimination first hand and discuss hate speech in a playful yet safe way. Minetest is an open source variant of the popular creative game Minecraft. If you download the free game beforehand you can join and “walk” with JFF in the interactive world. The workshop will be held in German.
  • Workshop 4
    Lithuanian workshop
    Tools to tackle violence, cyberbullying and hate speech online
    In this workshop, VsI Edukaciniai Projektai will present and try out in practice games developed throughout the project – YouTuber Simulator and Among all of us and other good practice examples on the European level. The workshop will be held in Lithuanian.

Download the PDF with the progamme.
Further information: sophia@savoirdevenir.net

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