Transatlantic Slave Trade (UNESCO-TST)

Transatlantic slave trade

The Transatlantic Slave Trade (UNESCO-TST) project unites schools from the three regions that participated in the triangular slave trade (Africa, America and Europe). The aim of this project is to raise awareness of the causes and consequences of the transatlantic slave trade - including modern forms of slavery and racism - through educational exchanges and best practices, as well as the creation and dissemination of educational materials. International gestures have been used on several occasions as an educational tool to improve knowledge about African languages and cultures in high schools, as well as a way to connect African students with colleagues from different parts of the world. Some examples of these activities (arranged chronologically):.

1999: Wolof Club

A collaboration between IES Pedra da Agua (Ponteareas, Galicia) and the Collège d'Enseignement Moyen de Ndoffanne, Kaolack (Senegal), allowed students from both schools to exchange information about their languages and cultures, the subjects of instruction in both countries. and their perspectives on the history of slavery. This happened long before any of these schools had access to the Internet, and the exchange was done through postcards that took several months. You can watch two videos made at the Galician school on the occasion of these activities:

Learning to greet and travel in Wolof, the language of Senegal

Questions in Wolof and Spanish that were sent to Senegal in the video

2000: Second TST European Regional Seminar, Lagos, Portugal, in November

The TST coordinators of Spain, Brazil and Mozambique, who participated in this event, agreed to do common activities around radio programs and learning African languages with international gestures

2001: Meeting of the UNESCO-ASP Schools of Brazil in São Luis do Maranhão, in July

The activities planned the previous year in Lagos were presented at this meeting, where the central theme was the Slave Route of the UNESCO-TST project.

You can see the presentation to the more than one hundred Brazilian teachers who participated in this meeting, including a practice with international gestures: the song "May 13", by Caetano Veloso, which celebrates the date of the abolition of slavery in Brazil

African languages at the European Year of Languages in Barcelona, in September

In the framework of this European project, an attempt was made to promote the knowledge of African languages:

Dara, a Brazilian song by Daniela Mercury in Portuguese and Yoruba

Solidarité, a Senegalese song by Youssu N 'Dour in Wolof

2003: Second TST Regional Youth Forum, Copenhagen, Denmark, in November

In this international meeting, international gestures were used to produce various activities on African languages and cultures.

Saúdos africanos en wolof e Ioruba

Swahili greeting and "Swing Low" (a song that helped slaves find their way to freedom)

Dara (a song in Portuguese and Yoruba that reflects African heritage in Brazil)

2004: African American poems in Cuba

The IPVCE "Ernesto Guevara" in Santa Clara prepared a series of Afro-Cuban poems with international signs for a TST meeting with Spanish schools in Cuba.

Example: Song Number 6. Of the Afro-Cuban poet Nicolás Guillén

Suahili Clubs

YoGoTe international signs were used to prepare several lessons for the introduction of foreign languages, two of them from Africa (Wolof and Swahili). This allowed the students to create Swahili clubs, where they learned basic expressions in this beautiful African language. We can also see an activity with a greeting song in Swahili:

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