Cultural engagement and lifelong learning in Duhok city- Kurdistan Region of Iraq
Society has a great need for places where people of all ages can meet and learn together and where meaning is created through the knowledge, understanding and appreciation of valuable objects to reach cultural engagement. This kind of learning environment already exists free from the bias created by commerce or politics. In these sense non-formal agencies including museums, galleries and libraries in promotinglearning within their communities must play a leading role as learning environments.
Universities and academic institutions should play their role to spread initiatives and positive ideas which brought lifelong education, arts and culture to the forefront of social and cultural development. This can be done,for instance, by supporting collaboration between universities and cultural organizations.Some of these key learning themes, such as peace and human security, human rights, participatory decision-making, gender equality and cultural diversity, are clear socio-cultural challenges which are core to the sustainable development agenda, but also critically relevant to culture plans and programmes. Whilst other key sustainable development themes are considered to be part of the economic and environmental dimensions of sustainability, their links to culture are inevitably established. In Kurdistan region of Iraq and especially in Duhok we need such a cultural engagement as the city is a multi-ethnic and religion city which community centers must do their role beside the non-formal agencies to reach sustainable development community, particularly in this time as the region is in a fragile situation due to religious unacceptance and some dusty ideologies.
We focus on the role of non-formal agencies including museums, galleries and libraries inpromotinglearning within their communities, and there are some areas we have chosen to discuss:
- Cultural polices as an agent for social change;
- Using cultural resourcesin an inclusive fashion to create a culture of learning throughout life;
- Meeting the challenge of access, learning and creativity through historical art collections.
The role of museums, libraries and community centers in the development of lifelong learning are both rich and diverse:
Museums, libraries and community centers can provide learning opportunities, and encourage and support learning communities to reach cultural engagement.
To achieve further development in lifelong learning, it is necessary to promote cultural democracy. This requires that museums, libraries and heritage and cultural institutions be recognized as places which reflect society in all its complexity and diversity. We recommend promoting cultural democracy by the following means:
- Making it available to every learner as a right;
- Developing various kinds of cultural institutions as participatory, pro-active learning environments;
- Encouraging greater participation and social inclusion;
- Acknowledging the inter-relatedness of culture, learning and participation.
Here in Duhok which is one of the Kurdistan reign cities and located in the north of Iraq. There is a collection of ethnics and religions in Duhok living together peacefully. So it is a successful story of democracy and respects each other in the country, Iraq. We have six big Universities and many community centers that can be used to act a vital role in the society.