The City of Edinburgh Council is delighted to be a partner with three other European UNESCO Cities of Literature – Leeuwarden (NL), Ljubljana (SI) and Nottingham - in the ‘Story Valley’ initiative, a European ERASMUS+ funding project, that uses oral history as a driver for improving literacy skills, preserving cultural heritage and enriching it with oral history and heritage of other cultures.
The STORY VALLEY project, which will run from November 2020 to August 2023, will use oral history as a driver for preserving cultural heritage and enriching it with linguistic diversity and the heritage of other cultures by combining the areas of literacy development, oral history and creative expression.
In partnership with Edinburgh College, students (including those from migrant backgrounds) will explore their own and each others’ oral history, language and literacy in an engaging and creative way. STORY VALLEY is an inclusive project which aims to stimulate intercultural dialogue and mutual understanding by fostering exchange which raises awareness of the importance of cultural heritage, how it shaped the present and how it can shape the future.
The project will stimulate innovative and creative thinking and expression by the creative transformation of stories through the involvement of creative practitioners. The project particularly seeks to target students with limited language and literacy skills involving them in an innovative process of peer and interdisciplinary learning by combining fields which are traditionally taught separately (language, literacy and literature with media, art and drama). This €450,000 project is entirely funded through ERASMUS+ European funding.
Edinburgh’s local creative partners are the Scottish Storytelling Centre, Edinburgh International Book Festival, The Scottish Poetry Library and UNESCO City of Literature.
Further information can be found on the Story Valley website.