Re-Make Action. Collective Achievement, Social Change and Children

This paper explores how collective achievement can move social change though children in «The Barter of Wonders». This is an action research project which started in 2018 to foster a more attentive and aware community through children, who will be the adults of tomorrow and who carry the message to their families. This is a project designed to raise awareness among children and their families on issues such as reuse, gift, friendship, which become a lifestyle through play. It started as a service within the Lions club “Apulia of Heritage and Citizens” (District 108 Ab – Apulia), and, since it was designed, The Laboratory of Communication and Empowerment of Places of the University of Salento (Department of Human and Social Science), has conceived and coordinated the research. These stakeholders have worked together to build a cyclical event that resembles a bazaar, where children can exchange their “wonders” and learn together, having fun, playing, and exchanging knowledge. The wonders to be exchanged are displayed on sack cloths sewn by the inmates of the Lecce prison with pieces of recycled and donated fabric, symbols of the new life towards which «The Barter of Wonders» wants to direct our path. This project was not simply presented to children: it was created with them through focus groups, social media surveys, semi-structured interviews and other actions that we designed during the project to intercept feedback from real or potential users. The research explores how collective action can affect social change, advocating a new paradigm that involves and affects all of our roles and functions. «The Barter of Wonders» looks at the gift as an element through which men create society by tightening bonds. The gift, here, is a social glue that creates relationships, establishes mutual obligations, and builds connections. The results achieved activate a molar learning mechanism through which people of different social backgrounds, ethnicities, interests are induced to interact and learn more or less consciously from each other.