About

Over its four year duration, the project is exploring knowledges and values underpinning peace and considering how these can be connected and compared across countries. An innovative element of the project is the use of Arts and Humanities methodologies that are continuously providing new, locally generated data on how peace is understood within displaced and marginalised communities. 

The project aims to explore how African knowledges and beliefs can decolonise pedagogies around how peace is taught and incorporated into education in Africa. Taking a deliberate emancipatory approach; researchers, community workers and communities that have experienced conflict are forging new connections across the continent to produce state of the art knowledge. 

Key to the first phase of the project is connecting across the African partner countries. Four Proof of Concept projects have been running in Nigeria, South Africa, Uganda, and Zimbabwe where local project teams are working in a diverse range of contexts and with a range of groups from Internally Displaced People (IDP) camps to refugee settlements, faith-based groups and communities. All the research, networking and knowledge exchange across these Proof-of-Concept projects has informed the subsequent stages of the project, which has seen DEPA commission eight new projects, and has seen the work extending to Algeria, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique and Sierra Leone.

Commissioned Research Projects

The DEPA project has funded a range of organisations, all working in Africa, some based in Africa, some in the UK, but forming strong research partnerships in-country.  Using a variety of arts and humanities research methodologies, from storytelling to Social-Emotional Learning (SEL), theatre and PhotoVoice, indigenous art forms to collaboratively produced photographs, drawings and images, these projects are expanding the DEPA themes in new and exciting ways. 

The ever-expanding network of DEPA artists, NGOs, academics, and researchers within Africa has enabled the project to expand both in geography and scope.

You can read more about these projects in our Network pages.