Educational Workshops: Collective Mapping of emotions and mapping using Body Maps

One of Urbana’s projects is the Educational Workshops with children and teenagers, like the one we organised in collaboration with ActionAid Hellas at the camp The Ranch at Sofiko. 

In this workshop, we used two methods of collective mapping. Mapping of emotions on cardboard, following with the technique of Body Maps.

Let’s value the knowledge that comes from people as living, feeling bodies in the world.

Body Maps are a tool of collective mapping that helps us analyse how the environment (both tangible and intangible) affects our bodies and how perceptions of fear and insecurity are experienced and felt physically. At the same time allows us to value the knowledge that comes from people as living bodies in the world. 

Body maps have been used as a tool of analysis in many disciplines since the 80s to study effects on people’s health, analyse the consequences of migratory processes or colonisation, or the impact of armed conflicts on the memory of individuals and communities.

In the workshop we implemented, the teenagers from Italy, Belgium, Romania, and Greece:

  • Made good use of the aforementioned mapping techniques.
  • Brought out gender issues that affect us daily, especially during adolescence. 
  • And talked openly about gender and identity matters and normal bodily functions like the period.

Our goal was, through this workshop, to provide interesting collective mapping tools and a “safe” and “brave” space for the participants to share their concerns in creative ways. In addition, to communicate, become empowered, and finally create bonds to act collectively in the future!

Location: summer camp The Ranch, Sofiko

Period: July 2022

Participated: teenagers from Italy, Belgium, Romania, and Greece

The workshop was organised in collaboration with ActionAid Hellas in the framework of the program Youth 4 Love 2, in which ActionAid Hellas participates.