2021 ENCATC Academy on Cultural Relations

ENCATC Academy on Cultural Relations was designed for the first time in 2012 to prepare academics, researchers, practitioners, policy makers, artists and students to deal with challenges in cultural relations and diplomacy.  It is meant to offer an intense learning experience with a mixed methodology including lectures and seminars and enhance with experts from the field. 

• Download the programme (PDF)

The 2021 ENCATC Academy was held online from 12-14 May 2021. Each day will have a different focus: 

• 12 May: RENEW - How academic institutions can be multipliers for international co-operation? 

The session was devoted to discussing roles, mechanisms, mediation and practices helping / enabling academics and researchers to develop international co-operation projects. What are the main issues/challenges in international co-operation in your area of work? What are possible ways to mitigated or solved them?  What are the benefits/opportunities arising from international co-operation? How can we work better together and bring new partners to join us? What could be the next steps for academics leading and enabling international co-operation? Participants had time to share their best tips for a smooth and successful international co-operation partnership/project as well as share ideas, pitch next projects, give examples: joint research projects, case analysis etc.

• 13 May: REIMAGINE - Global North & Global South Cultural Co-operation: Working Towards inclusive and equitable collaborations and partnerships

In this session focused broadly on the topic of international cultural co-operation. We seek to reflect on the implicit and explicit principles guiding cultural co-operation and the structures, conditions and processes for their development and implementation. We considered how the principles are or not applied in practice and what conditions are indeed shaping the inception, development and implementation of cultural co-operation projects. We wanted to question structures and power dynamics (e.g. ideas, money, expertise) in international cultural co-operation, and reflect on their impact. We ask what can be done, and how, to develop and implement inclusive and equitable collaborations and partnerships? We also questioned the symbolism of our language, including the binary use of North-South, and if inclusion and equity or fairness is what we should be striving for.

• 14 May: RECONNECT - Networks enabling people to (re)connect in pandemic times

This session focused on the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on international cultural co-operation. We explored the shift to/increase in the use of digital/online means for international cultural co-operation due to the general need for physical distancing, quarantines and travel restrictions. We were particularly interested in examining the role of networks to create and maintain communities of thinking and practice and understand how this has transferred to the digital world. Some of the questions we propose to explore are: how best to create and manage digital communities? When these digital communities are a transfer of existing ‘embodied’ communities, how best to welcome and include new members? How to spot the gaps in our communities? Whom do we need to invite to join us? How to build trust between existing and new members in the digital world? Are technologies enablers or inhibitors of engagement? Can digital engagement be better than in-person?

As part of the Academy, a case study from Latin America and the Caribbean area was also showcased. 

The Academy is an initiative of ENCATC done in partnership with New York University, Goldsmiths University of London, the University of Barcelona, the Association of Arts Administration Educators, and with the support of the Creative Europe programme of the European Union.